Strengths
To our knowledge, this is the first systematic study of the effects of
Portenoy and Foley’s seminal 1986 article. By analyzing 511 full-text
citing articles, this study paints a detailed picture of the substantial
and ongoing scientific impact of the index study. We analyzed all
identified and retrievable articles regardless of country of origin or
language of publication allowing us to establish a global, rather than
only North American, understanding of the index study’s impact. Finally,
this study uniquely combined bibliometrics, time-series analyses,
relational content analysis, and qualitative analysis. These multiple
analyses demonstrate strong concordance and thus strengthen our
confidence in the findings, and provide a deeper and broader
understanding of the evolution of opioid-related research between 1986
and 2019.