Therapeutic drug monitoring in oncology - What’s out there: A bibliometric evaluation on the topic

Pharmacological therapy is the mainstay of treatment for cancer patients. Despite wide interpatient variability in systemic drug concentrations for numerous antineoplastics, dosing based on body size remains the predominant approach. Therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) is used for few antineoplastics in specific scenarios. We conducted a rapid bibliometric evaluation of TDM in oncology to capture a snapshot of research in this area over time and explore topics that reflect development in the field. Reports with the composite, indexed term ‘therapeutic drug monitoring’ in the title and abstract were extracted from MEDLINE (inception to August 2021). Reports related to applications in cancer were selected for inclusion and were tagged by study design, antineoplastic drugs and concepts related to TDM. We present a timeline from 1980 to the present indicating the year of first report of antineoplastic agents and key terms. The reports in our sample primarily reflected development and validation of analytical methods with few relating to clinical outcomes to support implementation. Our work emphasises evidence gaps that may contribute to poor uptake of TDM in oncology.