# Characterizing the academic literature on surgical management of benign prostatic hyperplasia: A bibliometric analysis

## TL;DR

This paper analyzes global research trends in surgical treatments for benign prostatic hyperplasia, highlighting growth, key contributors, and emerging themes.

## Contribution

A comprehensive bibliometric analysis of BPH surgical literature, identifying trends and influential research actors from 2016 to 2025.

## Key findings

- The annual growth rate of publications on BPH surgical management was 2.9% between 2016 and 2025.
- 24.0% of the 2,613 publications involved international collaborations.
- Research trends reflect a shift toward minimally invasive and individualized urological care.

## Abstract

Historically managed with open surgery, benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) treatment has evolved significantly with the advent of less invasive procedures aimed at improving safety and recovery. We conducted a bibliometric study using the Web of Science Core Collection to analyze global publication trends related to surgical management of BPH. Our aim was to identify leading authors, institutions, countries, influential journals, and evolving research themes to guide future investigations.

A bibliometric study was performed using the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) as the primary database. Only original articles and reviews published in English were eligible for inclusion. VOSviewer (v1.6.20) was used to generate co-authorship, country collaboration, and keyword co-occurrence maps. CiteSpace (v6.3.R1) was applied for detecting citation bursts and thematic shifts, while the Bibliometrix package in R (v4.2.1) was utilized for descriptive statistics, Bradford’s Law analysis, and network visualizations. Simple linear regression was applied as a descriptive tool to indicate the overall direction of publication growth and was not intended to model non-linear innovation dynamics or provide predictive inference.

Between January 2016 and August 2025, a total of 2,613 publications on surgical management of BPH were identified. Among these, 2,161 were original articles and 452 were reviews, published across 394 different journals. The annual growth rate was calculated at 2.9%, confirming a steady increase in research output during the study period. Each paper had an average of 3.97 authors, with a mean citation rate of 10.7 per document. The dataset contained 24,415 references, while 24.0% of publications involved international collaborations.

This analysis offers a comprehensive view of global research efforts in surgical BPH management, identifying high-yield topics, influential actors, and emerging modalities. This evolving literature base reflects a broader trend toward individualized, minimally invasive care in urology, with BPH management serving as an example.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00345-026-06257-9.