Research trends of platelet-rich plasma therapy on knee osteoarthritis from 2011 to 2021: A review

Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) has been widely used to alleviate osteoarthritis of the knee, and research results are abundant. However, there are no bibliometric reports in publications in this field. Therefore, the current status of PRP for the treatment of osteoarthritis of the knee from 2011 to 2021 was analyzed using Citespace 6.1.R2 software. METHODS: Publications regarding PRP treating Knee Osteoarthritis between 2011 and 2021 were extracted from the Web of Science database. CiteSpace was used to analyze the number of publications, countries, institutions, journals, authors, cited references, and keywords by using standard bibliometric indicators. RESULTS: A total of 988 publications were searched from 2011 to 2021. In the last decade, the number of publications has increased in the field. Brian J. Cole was the author with the most output, with 31 relevant articles, and Giuseppe Filardo ranked first in cited authors. Am J Sport Med was the most cited journal. In this field, the most prolific country is the United States and the most prolific institution is Rush University. An article published by Sandeep Patel ranked first in cited references with 118 citations. “Randomized controlled trial” was the most bursting keyword and other more popular keywords about PRP for knee osteoarthritis: “hyaluronic acid,” “double-blind,” and “mesenchymal stem cell.” CONCLUSION: This bibliometric study provides a decade of current clinical research on PRP for the treatment of osteoarthritis of the knee, which can help researchers understand the hot spots in the field and provide a new direction for their research.