The current status and hot topics of endoscopic techniques in breast cancer surgery: a global bibliometric and visualization analysis (1999–2024)

Abstract Breast cancer is the most common malignant tumor in women worldwide, and surgery is still its main treatment modality. In recent years, endoscopic-assisted breast surgery has received widespread attention for its minimally invasive and aesthetic advantages, but its safety is still controversial.001 This study investigates the development trend and research hotspots of endoscopic surgery for breast cancer through bibliometric analysis. Based on the Web of Science database (1999–2024), we searched and screened the relevant English literature, and used tools such as R, Bibliometrix, VOSviewer, and CiteSpace to conduct the metrological and visualization analyses of countries, institutions, authors, journals, and keywords. As a result, a total of 230 documents were included, and China, Japan, and the United States were the major research countries in this field, with China dominating in terms of the number of publications and international collaborations. Changhua Christian Hospital in Taiwan, China was the most active research institution, while scholars such as Lai, Hung-Wen were the most prolific and highly cited authors. Core journals include Annals of Surgical Oncology. The analysis of highly cited literature and keywords shows that the research hotspot has gradually shifted from axillary lymph node dissection and breast ductoscopy in the early days to nipple-sparing mastectomy and breast reconstruction. Currently, research is mainly focused on key technologies such as endoscopic and robot-assisted breast reconstruction. In the future, the oncologic safety and long-term aesthetic results of endoscopic surgery will become an important research direction.