Publication trends of PCL in the last 40 years on PubMed.

BACKGROUND

Posterior Cruciate Ligament (PCL) is one of the key ligaments of the knee. PubMed data has not been previously analyzed on this topic. This study aims to summarize data of 40 years from 1979 to 2018 in PubMed on this topic.

METHODS

A search was conducted in PubMed on PCL for the last 40 years using a search strategy, and the output was analyzed for further details. Data was also sought from Scopus concerning top universities and countries publishing on PCL as this information was not extractable from PubMed. VOS Viewer was used to analyzing text occurrences in authors and titles visually.

RESULTS

Total publications on PCL were 5087 from 1915 to 27 February 2019 when this search was done and 5025 in the last 40 years until 31 December 2018. The yearly average of publication numbers has seen a steady increase. Top journal and author on PCL publications were KSSTA and LaPrade RF respectively. Most papers published by a First author was by Fanelli GC. Time-based links of LaPrade RF to other authors were represented as a VOS output. The USA was the most published country, and 8 of 10 Universities which published were from the USA.

CONCLUSIONS

There has been a steady and significant increase in the number of articles published in PubMed since 1979. It is obvious that the topic of PCL has gained attention and importance in the recent past and has seen a steady increase over the last few years. This article summarises the increased interest and could act as a baseline for future studies.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE

Level IV.