The most cited articles in hand surgery over the past 20-plus years: a modern-day reading list.

PURPOSE: To create a current reading list of the hand surgery articles most commonly cited in the last 20-plus years.

METHODS: Using the Web of Science Citation Index Search, we searched "hand" and "wrist" in the orthopedic, surgery, and sport sciences research areas. We then reviewed the articles and chose the 50 most commonly cited articles related to hand surgery. Articles were categorized as clinical or basic science. Clinical articles were subcategorized as either therapeutic, prognostic, diagnostic, or economic/decision analysis and assigned a level of evidence rating. We calculated the number of citations per year (citation density).

RESULTS: The total number of citations for the top 50 articles ranged from 92 to 317. Citation density ranged from 4 to 24 (average, 9.7). Of the 50 articles, 39 were clinical (78%), whereas the remainder were basic science. Clinical articles were most commonly therapeutic (25 of 39; 64%), followed by diagnostic (11 of 39; 28%) and prognostic (3 of 39; 8%). There were no economic/decision analysis-type articles. The most common level of evidence was level IV, which made up 38% of the list (19 of 50 articles). The second most common was level I, which represented 20% of the list (10 of 50 articles). A total of 70% of the articles (35 of 50) were published between 1990 and 1999, and the remainder of the articles were published after 1999. Fifty percent of the articles appeared in the Journal of Hand Surgery, American volume.

CONCLUSIONS: Many of the articles found on our list have shaped the way we practice hand surgery today. We hope that this report and the articles it names can help residents and fellows study current hand surgery and its evolution over the past 20 years.

TYPE OF STUDY/LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Economic and decision analyses IV.