Abstract
Many articles have been published on actinic keratosis. Bibliometric analysis helps identify the most influential studies in a particular field, Our article was to identify the 100 most frequently cited references on actinic keratosis through bibliometric analysis. As of March 1, 2020, actinic keratosis was searched in the Web of Science database and ranked in order of the total number of citations. The top 100 most cited articles in actinic keratosis were analysed. The top 100 most cited articles on actinic keratosis were published between 1982 and 2020. The largest number of articles were published in a single interval in 2001-2005. The average annual citations increased first and then decreased. The total citations were positively correlated with annual citations. The 100 articles were classified into different research focuses: pathogenesis (33%), treatment (24%), clinical features and diagnosis (15%), pathophysiology (8%), epidemiology (5%), associated diseases (2%) and others (13%). Among these 100 articles, 5 were clinical trials, 14 focused on the association between actinic keratosis and P53, and 9 reported the association between actinic keratosis and 5-aminolevulinic acid. The 100 articles were published in 38 journals by 87 different first corresponding authors from 15 different countries, mostly in the USA and Australia. Stockfleth, E from the University of Berlin published the most articles as the corresponding author. The top 100 cited references of actinic keratosis were identified and their bibliometric characteristics were analysed to lay a foundation for further research.