Global research trends of cell-free nucleic acids in obstetrics and
gynecology during 2017-2021: a systematic review
Abstract
Background Cell-free DNA, a suitable candidate biomarker forming an
emerging field of non-invasive evaluation, has been detected for great
clinical applications and increasingly used in obstetrics and
gynecology. Objective To describe an intuitive global research trends of
cfDNA related literature from a bibliometric perspective, and provide
researchers with new research hotspots. Search strategy The literature
form PubMed and Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) database related
to cfDNA from January 1 2017 to December 31 2021 were extracted for
co-word and VOSviewer analysis, respectively. Study criteria We selected
studies where cfDNA was applied for obstetrics and gynecology, i.e.,
prenatal diagnosis, preimplantation diagnosis, next generation
sequencing technology, mosaicism detection or adverse pregnancy
outcomes. Data collection and analysis Bibliographic Item Co-Occurrence
Matrix Builder, gCLUTO software and VOSviewer were used to perform
bibliometrics analysis. Main results Themes in the third quadrant of
strategy diagram, including cell-free nucleic acid sequence analysis for
non-invasive prenatal testing and genetic testing, the application of
cfDNA in the fields of neoplasms genetics and diagnosis are immature
themes which are considered newly emerging themes of cfDNA. VOSviewer
results showed the global research trends of cfDNA including authors,
institutions, countries, journals and research hotspots. Conclusion By
analyzing the research hotspots related to cfDNA, immature themes and
emerging hotspots deserve more attention and can be considered as hints
when launching new research projects. The five major research hotspots
could provide an insight into cfDNA research and valuable information
for researchers to identify potential collaborators and partner
institutions.