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Medically refractory cases of trigeminal neuralgia often require treatment escalation. Surgical options include microvascular decompression and percutaneous ablation. This paper provides a bibliometric analysis of the most influential articles on the surgical management of trigeminal neuralgia. The Web of Science database was queried to identify the top 100 cited articles concerning surgical treatment of trigeminal neuralgia. The search terms used included ALL=(("trigeminal neuralgia" OR "tic douloureux" OR "Fothergill's disease" OR "Trifacial neuralgia") AND ("surgical treatment" OR "surgical management" OR "surgery" OR "neurosurgery") NOT ("radiosurgery" OR "gamma knife")). The extracted variables included the first and senior author names, journal, publication year, institution, and surgical modality. Our bibliometric search yielded 2104 studies, with 41,502 citations overall. Within the top 100 articles, Zakrzewska had the most first author papers (n = 5), and Burchiel had the most senior author papers (n = 6). The Massachusetts General Hospital was the most represented institution (n = 5). The United States was the most represented country (51%). Microvascular decompression was the most studied surgical strategy (51%), followed by percutaneous radiofrequency coagulation (9%), balloon/nerve compression (7%), and glycerol rhizolysis (7%). Some studies assessed multiple treatment modalities (22%). The types of studies included retrospective articles (58%), prospective articles (26%), reviews (10%), anatomic studies (2%), and basic science (1%). Neurosurgery (35%) and the Journal of Neurosurgery (33%) were the most represented journals. The current literature consists of retrospective reviews and mostly describes microvascular decompression for trigeminal neuralgia. Future studies should include further characterization of other surgical modalities such as percutaneous radiofrequency thermocoagulation, glycerol injection, and balloon compression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of our bibliometric analysis was to explore the disciplinary hotspots and collaborative networks in research on neuropathic pain (NPP) during in the past 20 years. The studies related to NPP were obtained from Web of Science database. Global publications on NPP were analyzed for different factors, including the number of reports, citation rates, authors, institutions, countries and regions, journals, funding, and relevant partnerships and topic hotspots. From 2001 to 2020, 6905 studies related to NPP research were reported worldwide. The number of publications had increased continually during the past 20 years. Pain was the most productive and most frequently co-cited journal. Ralf Baron was the most productive and influential author. The most productive country and institution were the United States and Harvard University, respectively. Investigators and institutions from the United States, Japan, and China were the core research forces. We found broad and close cooperation in the field worldwide. The top authors and top institutions had collaborated relatively closely with others. The research of NPP is a well-developed and prospective field of medical study. The journals Pain, European Journal of Pain, and Molecular Pain showed more interested in this field. The United States, Harvard University, and Ralf Baron were the top country, institution, and author, respectively. Global research collaboration was extensive, with the top institutions and authors cooperating with others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]