Research trends in depression associated with gynecologic cancers from 2006 to 2025: a multidatabase bibliometric and...

Gynecologic malignancies are an important cause of illness among women. Depressive symptoms are common throughout diagnosis, treatment, and survivorship. However, bibliometric evidence concerning this topic remains scarce. This bibliometric analysis characterizes research trends and identifies major research hotspots in the literature on depression associated with gynecologic cancer, thereby informing future research and clinical practice.

Relevant publications issued from January 1, 2006, to December 31, 2025, were identified through WOSCC, PubMed, and Scopus. The records were examined and mapped with VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and bibliometrix.

The final analysis comprised 734 publications. Research output on depression in patients with gynecologic cancer generally increased from 2006 to 2025. The USA accounted for the greatest share of the literature, and the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center contributed the most papers among institutions. Sood, Anil K. had the most prolific author, whereas the publications by Lutgendorf, Susan K. had the highest average citation count. Among the journals analyzed, Gynecologic Oncology ranked first in terms of both publication output and total citations. The most frequent keywords were "quality of life", "depression", "women", "ovarian cancer", "cervical cancer". Keywords with citation bursts continuing through 2025 included "cohort analysis", "retrospective study", "patient-reported outcomes", "nausea", "multicenter study", "uterus cancer" and "sleep disturbance".

Depression associated with gynecologic cancers has received increasing attention, with growing emphasis on patients' quality of life. Future research may increasingly focus on the treatment and supportive care of depression in patients with gynecologic cancers.