ReviewFrontiers in surgery2026
Bibliometric and network analysis of acute conus medullaris syndrome and conus-related complications after lumbar spine procedures.
Review in Frontiers in surgery, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Acute conus medullaris syndrome (ACMS) is an uncommon but potentially devastating neurological complication that may occur after lumbar spine procedures, including minimally invasive lumbar discectomy. Despite its very low incidence, ACMS can result in major functional impairment and significant medicolegal consequences. The available evidence is largely case-based and widely dispersed, and no bibliometric synthesis has comprehensively mapped the global research landscape on ACMS and related conus-level postoperative complications. Methods: We searched PubMed (MEDLINE), Scopus, the Cochrane Library, and JSTAGE (January 1977-February 2025). After de-duplication and screening, no additional unique eligible publications were identified beyond PubMed; the final corpus therefore comprised PubMed-indexed records retrieved using MeSH terms and free-text keywords. Study identification and selection were reported in accordance with PRISMA 2020, adapted for bibliometric/mapping review methodology. Records were analyzed using Bibliometrix (R/Biblioshiny) and VOSviewer to assess productivity, collaboration, source concentration, and thematic structures. Results: The final dataset included 46 publications (1977-2025) from 34 sources, authored by 185 authors, with two single-authored documents and a mean of 4.15 co-authors per document. International co-authorship was limited (4.35%). PubMed publication-type tagging indicated that 38 records (82.6%) carried a "case reports" tag and 11 records (23.9%) carried a "review" tag (tags may overlap within a single record). A small core of specialist spine and neurosurgical journals accounted for a disproportionate share of publications. Thematic mapping showed dominant technique- and outcome-focused themes, whereas ACMS did not consistently emerge as a mature standalone thematic cluster. Conclusions: The global literature on ACMS and conus-related postoperative complications after lumbar spine procedures is extremely sparse, fragmented, and predominantly case-based, with limited international collaboration. Given the small sample size (46 publications), our findings should be interpreted as exploratory rather than definitive. Advancing knowledge in this area will likely require multicentre registries, standardized reporting frameworks, and coordinated data-sharing to enable cumulative evidence generation and improved patient-safety learning.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.