• Do-Young Kang, Hyungsuk Kim, Koh-Woon Kim, and Won-Seok Chung.
• Department of Rehabilitation Medicine of Korean Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
• Medicine (Baltimore). 2022 Sep 16; 101 (37): e30413.

BackgroundRheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory autoimmune disease, which is well known for its poor symptoms, and the incidence is increasing worldwide. Although conventional medicines are practiced initially, patients often move or accompany to complementary and alternative medicines for better outcomes. Herbal medications, one of traditional medicinal approach, are widely used in clinical conditions. However, no research has broadly reviewed the current research trends regarding the scope of herbal medicines in RA. The aim of this study was to conduct a bibliometric analysis of applications of herbal medicine for RA from 1991 to the present.MethodsWe retrieved literature on herbal medicine for RA from the Web of Science database from 1991 to 2021. The VOSviewer program was used to analyze keywords, authors, countries, and organizations through visual knowledge mapping to assess the research hotspots and trends.ResultsA total of 516 articles were included in the analysis, which showed an increasing trend in the number of publications over time. Four clusters were identified from the keyword analysis: complementary and alternative medicine cluster, mechanism of the pain cluster, control for the pain cluster, and recent research trend cluster. People's Republic of China published 250 articles, which was the greatest number of publications, followed by the United States of America (82 articles) and South Korea (52 articles). Furthermore, Moudgil, KD of the University of Maryland published 15 articles about the mechanism of herbal medicine on autoimmune arthritis and their interaction with various drugs. Lu, AP of the Hong Kong Baptist University published 14 articles about herbal medicine interactions. On an institutional level, the China Academy of Chinese Medical Science published 33 articles, followed by the Hong Kong Baptist University and the University of Maryland with 27 and 20 articles, respectively. Clusters of organizations from the People's Republic of China and the United States of America revealed higher average citations for earlier average publication years.ConclusionsThis bibliometric study identified trends in herbal medicine for RA from 1991 to 2021, which may guide the hot topics and future directions in this research field.Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.

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