Objectives: Disorders of consciousness (DoC) is a dynamic and challenging discipline, presenting intriguing challenges to clinicians and neurorehabilitation specialists for the lack of reliable assessment methods and interventions. Understanding DoC keeps pace with scientific research is urgent to need. We quantitively analyzed publications on DoC over the recent 10 years via bibliometrics analysis, to summarize the intellectual structure, current research hotspots, and future research trends in the field of DoC. Methods: Literature was obtained from the Science Citation Index Expanded of Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC). To illustrate the knowledge structure of DoC, CiteSpace 5.8.R3 was used to conduct a co-occurrence analysis of countries, institutions, and keywords, and a co-citation analysis of references and journals. Also, Gephi 0.9.2 contributed to the author and co-cited author analysis. We found the most influential journals, authors, and countries and the most talked about keywords in the last decade of research. Results: A total of 1919 publications were collected. Over the past 10 years, the total number of annual publications has continued to increase, with the largest circulation in 2018. We found most DoC research and close cooperation originated from developed countries, e.g., the USA, Canada, and Italy. Academics from Belgium appear to have a strong presence in the field of DoC. The most influential journals were also mainly distributed in the USA and some European countries. Conclusions: This bibliometric study sheds light on the knowledge architecture of DoC research over the past decade, reflecting current hotspots and emerging trends, and providing new insights for clinicians and academics interested in DoC. The hot issues in DoC were diagnosing and differentiating the level of consciousness, and detecting covert awareness in early severe brain-injured patients. New trends focus on exploring the recovery mechanism of DoC and neuromodulation techniques.
Keywords: CiteSpace; bibliometric analysis; disorders of consciousness; visualization; web of science.