Research trends of neoadjuvant therapy in lung cancer: a bibliometric analysis

Lung cancer is the most prevalent malignancy worldwide. Only a fraction of early-stage patients undergo radical surgery; however, many still experience recurrence and metastasis within 5 years postoperatively (approximately 30-75%). Neoadjuvant therapy has revolutionized the treatment approach for lung cancer, with a growing number of clinical trials investigating this modality. This study provides a comprehensive analysis of neoadjuvant therapy in lung cancer, intending to guide future research.

To extract literature on neoadjuvant therapy for lung cancer published in the Web of Science Core Collection, spanning January 1, 2004, to December 31, 2023. Utilizing software tools including VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and GraphPad Prism to conduct bibliometric analysis and visualization studies on countries, institutions, journals, authors, co-cited references, and keywords in this field.

A sum of 6,085 research publications from 84 countries were analyzed, with the United States leading in publications on neoadjuvant therapy for lung cancer. The institution that publishes the most articles is the University of Texas System. The most published journal is Annals of Thoracic Surgery, while the most frequently co-cited journal is Journal of Clinical Oncology. Eight of the top ten co-cited references concern immune checkpoint inhibitors(ICIs). Keyword burst analysis indicates that the current research focuses and trends mainly center around four areas: ICIs, clinical trials, efficacy, and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

This is the first bibliometric study of neoadjuvant therapy in lung cancer. Over the past two decades, interest in this field has steadily increased, particularly since 2017. The United States is the largest contributor and has the highest number of publications in this field. Immune checkpoint inhibitors, clinical trials, efficacy, and NSCLC are hotspots in neoadjuvant therapy for lung cancer, both now and in the foreseeable future.