BACKGROUND

Acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD (AECOPD) can cause a significant decrease in patient lung function, and are the main reason for hospitalization and death of patients with COPD. This study aims to use bibliometric methods to analyze the characteristics of AECOPD related research in the past 10 years [2010-2020] and provide references for future research.

METHODS

This study used subject terms to search AECOPD-related documents published in 2010-2020 in the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-E) database. The search terms were "AECOPD" or "acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease." We use the CiteSpace software to analyze the target literature records. The analysis includes: the annual distribution of literature publications, the distribution of published literature sources (including countries, institutions, journals, and authors), and using keywords.

RESULTS

A total of 3,785 articles on AECOPD were published between 2010 and 2020, with 62,162 citations. Both the number of published documents and the number of citations has increased with time. The literature mainly comes from several developed countries, including European and North American countries, and the cooperation between institutions and authors in these countries is relatively close. The main journals are the top journals of respiratory specialty and the top comprehensive journals. The results of the keyword analysis show that the current research is on risk factors, biomarkers, and AECOPD management.

CONCLUSIONS

AECOPD research tends to focus on a precise diagnosis and treatment, and prevention of AECOPD in patients with COPD should be paid more attention.