Research Trends around Exercise Rehabilitation among Cancer Patients: A Bibliometrics and Visualized Knowledge Graph Analysis

This study analyzed the research hotspots and frontiers of exercise rehabilitation among cancer patients via CiteSpace. Relevant literature published in the core collection of the Web of Science (WoS) database from January 1, 2000, to February 6, 2022, was searched. Further, we used CiteSpace5.8R1 to generate a network map and identified top authors, institutions, countries, keywords, and research trends. A total of 2706 related literature were retrieved. The most prolific writer was found to be Kathryn H Schmitz (21 articles). The University of Toronto (64 articles) was found to be the leading institution, with the United States being the leading country. Further, “rehabilitation,” “exercise,” “quality of life,” “cancer,” and “physical activity” were the top 5 keywords based on frequency; next, “disability,” “survival,” “fatigue,” “cancer,” and “rehabilitation” were the top 5 keywords based on centrality. The keyword “fatigue” was ranked at the top of the most cited list. Finally, “rehabilitation medicine,” “activities of daily living,” “lung neoplasm,” “implementation,” “hospice,” “exercise oncology,” “mental health,” “telemedicine,” and “multidisciplinary” are potential topics for future research. Our results show that the research hotspots have changed from “quality of life,” “survival,” “rehabilitation,” “exercise,” “cancer,” “physical therapy,” “fatigue,” and “breast cancer” to “exercise oncology,” “COVID-19,” “rehabilitation medicine,” “inpatient rehabilitation,” “implementation,” “telemedicine,” “lung neoplasm,” “telehealth,” “multidisciplinary,” “psycho-oncology,” “hospice,” “adapted physical activity,” “cancer-related symptom,” “cognitive function,” and “behavior maintenance.” Future research should explore the recommended dosage and intensity of exercise in cancer patients. Further, following promotion of the concept of multidisciplinary cooperation and the rapid development of Internet medical care, a large amount of patient data has been accumulated; thus, how to effectively use this data to generate results of high clinical value is a question for future researchers.