Objective: To perform a bibliometric analysis on the top-cited articles over the last three decades from 1989 to 2018, using a longitudinal set-up, in order to analyse how articles' features have evolved over time.
Setting and sample population: A sample of 312 articles divided into three subgroups of 104 top-cited articles for each decade were included. The h-index value was used to determine the sample size.
Materials and methods: The articles were identified through a search in the category "dentistry oral surgery and medicine" of the Web of Science database. The information relative to the articles was collected. Descriptive statistics was used to describe the articles and the journals; selected parameters were analysed with the Kruskal-Wallis and the Mann-Whitney U test at the 0.05 level of significance.
Results: The top-cited articles were published mainly by orthodontic journals. Along the last two decades, the scientific contribution of Asian and South American countries rose significantly. The trending topics varied in each decade. Skeletal anchorage-related articles dominated the production of the decade 1999-2008 while new technologies as CBCT displayed a higher prevalence in the last decade, where new topics such as corticotomy-assisted orthodontics started to appear. The number of multi-authored articles increased while the articles from no university institutions decreased.
Conclusion: The publications in the three studied decades were significantly different in terms of numbers and characteristics. A longitudinal set-up allows to study the evolution of the scientific production and how the area of interest has developed over time.
Keywords: bibliometrics; citation analysis; orthodontics; top-cited.
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