Scientometrics
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. May 28, 2023; 29(20): 3203-3215
Published online May 28, 2023. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v29.i20.3203
Global research trends on diet and nutrition in Crohn’s disease
Muna Shakhshir, Sa'ed H Zyoud
Muna Shakhshir, Department of Nutrition, An-Najah National University Hospital, Nablus 44839, Palestine
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Department of Clinical and Community Pharmacy, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Nablus 44839, Palestine
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Poison Control and Drug Information Center (PCDIC), College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Nablus 44839, Palestine
Sa'ed H Zyoud, Clinical Research Centre, An-Najah National University Hospital, Nablus 44839, Palestine
Author contributions: Zyoud SH designed the study, collected the data, analyzed the data, made major contributions to the manuscript’s literature search and interpretation, and drafted the manuscript; Shakhshir M made major contributions to the manuscript’s literature search and interpretation and made revisions to the initial draft; all authors provided a critical review and approved the final manuscript before submission.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no financial disclosures or conflicts of interest to declare.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Sa’ed H Zyoud, PhD, Full Professor, Department of Clinical and Community Pharmacy, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, An-Najah National University, Academic Street, Nablus 44839, Palestine. saedzyoud@yahoo.com
Received: January 9, 2023
Peer-review started: January 9, 2023
First decision: March 8, 2023
Revised: March 20, 2023
Accepted: May 4, 2023
Article in press: May 4, 2023
Published online: May 28, 2023
Processing time: 136 Days and 24 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Crohn’s disease represents a challenge for patients concerned with the modified diet regimen as well as practitioners who seek the best nutritional therapy. Crohn’s disease can alter the body’s ability to digest food and to absorb nutrients, resulting in severe vitamin deficiencies, malnutrition and sometimes life-threatening complications. However, a comprehensive bibliometric analysis is lacking to map the current links between nutrition and Crohn’s disease in terms of the number of citations, geographic distribution and growth trends of publications.

AIM

To introduce the current state of research as well as hotspots in the field of nutrition and Crohn’s disease from a bibliometric standpoint.

METHODS

We searched the Scopus database and selected the relevant literature on nutrition and Crohn’s disease that met the inclusion criteria. We analyzed the publication trends and research hotspots by using video object segmentation viewer software.

RESULTS

We included 1237 publications. The number of documents published each year has increased steadily. The United States and the University of Otago, Christchurch, have had the highest productivity, with 208 (16.81%) and 29 (2.34%) documents, respectively. The “role of exclusive enteral nutrition for complicated Crohn’s disease” and “manipulation of the gut microbiota as a key target for Crohn’s disease” were the major research areas in 2016-2021, and they could be extensively investigated in the future. Meanwhile, research on “malnutrition in patients with Crohn’s disease” appeared to be an area that attracted more research attention before 2016.

CONCLUSION

This is the first bibliometric analysis to map the knowledge structure and trends regarding nutrition in Crohn’s disease research over the past two decades. The results provide a comprehensive summary and identification of the frontiers of nutrition and Crohn’s disease-related research, which may be used as a resource by researchers in the field.

Keywords: Nutrition; Diet; Crohn’s disease; Bibliometric; Microbiota; Malnutrition

Core Tip: There is much interest in using nutrition therapy approaches to treat Crohn’s disease, while the current state of knowledge is still inadequate to make general recommendations. Therefore, a bibliometric analysis of the global trend in research on nutrition and Crohn’s disease was conducted. This study outlines the current state of research themes and hotspots in nutrition and Crohn’s disease research because no bibliometric research has been conducted to determine worldwide trends in nutrition and Crohn’s disease. This facilitates researchers and healthcare providers in identifying potential future research directions.