Evolution of Treatment Modalities for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Top 100 Cited Articles From 1990 to 2020

Objective: Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is seen in a substantial proportion of individuals experiencing trauma. The last few decades have been significant in terms of PTSD-related research; however, a quantitative charting of the evolution in evidence-based treatment modalities for PTSD is lacking. The objective of this study was to conduct a bibliometric analysis to bridge this gap in knowledge.

Methods: The database Scopus was searched in November 2022, with a timeframe set from 1990 to 2020. Only original articles were included. The 100 most-cited articles were compiled in the final list via manual screening. The selected studies primarily focused on the treatment modalities of PTSD. These articles were then analyzed for factors such as citation count, citations per year, citation trend, country of origin, and author affiliation. Microsoft Excel version 2016 and SPSS version 26 were used for the analysis.

Results: The 100 most-cited articles were published between 1990 and 2015. The number of citations was 35,549, with a maximum of 1,056 and a minimum of 315 (median = 282, interquartile range [IQR] = 139). The number of citations per year ranged between 7.03 and 46.5 (mean = 20.3009, median = 17.49, IQR = 11.215). Most of these articles were published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (25 articles); 2012 was the year with the peak citations per year, and the trend declined notably after 2016. The 5-year average citations reached their maximum during 2014-2018. The trend declined between 2019 and 2022. The year 2003 was the most productive in terms of academic outcome (10 articles). More than half of the 100 articles originated in the United States (77 articles), followed by the United Kingdom (8 articles) and Germany (7 articles). The total number of authors involved was 641 (median = 6, IQR = 4). A possible reason for the increase in citations around these articles is that the planned update to the current DSM version motivated considerable research, contributing to the increased citations around its release. Researchers focused on validating new diagnostic criteria and understanding their implications, resulting in a significant surge in publications and citations.

Conclusion: The data show that most of these articles originated from developed countries, pointing out the need to conduct more region-specific research in developing and underdeveloped areas as well.

Prim Care Companion CNS Disord 2024;26(6):24nr03767.

Author affiliations are listed at the end of this article.