Visualization and Bibliometric Analysis of the Research Progress and Trends of Air Embolism

The etiology and diagnosis of air embolism (AE), including approaches for prevention and management based on experimental and clinical data, have been presented. However, these publications may not reach all the intended audience (e.g., surgeons), and thus, the use of bibliometric analyses is encouraged.

We queried the Web of Science database using bibliometric analysis to identify publications related to AE from 1995 to 2022.

The literature search retrieved 2463 publications that met the inclusion criteria. In AE research, the total number of articles published every year was 80±16, and it increased gradually in recent years. Many published articles and most of the top ten research institutions (8/10) were from the USA (n = 826, 33.5%). The USA also has the highest citations and the most extensive cooperation with most countries. However, the proportion of the top ten journals is not too high, and the quality of these papers is not sufficiently good. The mean number of citations for the top ten articles was 105.8 (range: 68-298). Moreover, ten authors contributed to 146 manuscripts from eight countries. A total of 7926 keywords were found. Among these, 135 were hotspot keywords that appeared at least 20 times. The keywords with strong citation bursts changed from dog to risk factors of AE (7.66 versus 9.81).

We explore the citation relevance and collaboration map and their hotspots in AE and provide a foundational understanding of the research progress and trends of AE.