Citation classics in the burn literature during the past 55 years.

The objective of this study was to identify the 100 most cited, peer-reviewed burn-related articles over the past half century. Burn care presents ongoing challenges to both U.S. civilian and military healthcare personnel. Improvements in burn survival and quality of life are the result of advances in burn research. The Web of Science (including Science Citation Index) was searched for the most cited articles related to burn care, published from 1955 to the present. The most cited article was "Permanent coverage of large burn wounds with autologous cultured human epithelium," by G.G. Gallico et al, New England Journal of Medicine, 1984 (711 citations). Between the 1970s and the 1990s, there was a near doubling of the number of highly cited publications with each subsequent decade. A total of 85% of the articles were on the topics of pathophysiology (37%), wounds, tissue, or dressings (31%), or organ failure/sepsis (17%). B.A. Pruitt Jr. (2320 citations), D.N. Herndon (1972 citations), and A.D. Mason Jr. (1435 citations) were the most cited authors. This study identified some of the most important contributions to burn research and the areas of greatest scientific interest to the specialty during the past five decades, and highlights key research that has contributed to the evolution of modern burn care.