World orofacial pain research production: a bibliometric study (2004-2005).
OBJECTIVE
To provide a snapshot of the scientific literature on orofacial pain.


METHODS
The authors identified 975 papers related to orofacial pain in the Current Contents Life Sciences and Clinical Medicine collections of the Thomson Scientific database that were published during 2004 and 2005 and analyzed them using bibliometric indicators.


RESULTS
Among the 54 countries involved, the United States ranks first by number of papers (293), followed by Japan (107), and the United Kingdom (90). The high volume of research activity in some Northern European countries is highlighted, along with that of the European Union (384 papers). The scientific literature on orofacial pain was published in 247 journals; 13 of the top 15 most prolific journals for articles on orofacial pain were found in the Dentistry, Oral Surgery and Medicine subdiscipline of Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, and the Journal of Orofacial Pain was the highest ranked for such articles.


CONCLUSIONS
This study complements subject reviews of orofacial pain research and provides a more complete picture of the research activity in this field.
Robert
Claude
C
Université Paris Descartes, Faculté de Chirurgie Dentaire, Laboratoire d'Anatomie Fonctionnelle, Montrouge, France. claude.robert@univ-paris5.fr
Caillieux
Nicolas
N
Wilson
Concepción S
CS
Gaudy
Jean-François
JF
Arreto
Charles-Daniel
CD
D015706:Bibliometrics; D019992:Databases as Topic; D018865:Dental Research; D005060:Europe; D005062:European Union; D005157:Facial Pain; D006801:Humans; D007391:International Cooperation; D007564:Japan; D010506:Periodicals as Topic; D006113:United Kingdom; D014481:United States