Bibliometric analysis of the scientific production on palliative care in Scopus

Introduction and objective: Palliative care is an approach that improves the quality of life in terminally ill patients. In the coming years, there will be a great need for this service due to an increase in the elderly population and in the diseases that affect this age group. Not all Latin American and Caribbean countries have national palliative care policies. The aim of this study was to describe the scientific production on palliative care in Latin America and the Caribbean. Methods: A bibliometric study on palliative care was conducted in the Scopus database between 1990 and 2019, focusing on papers whose authors had at least one affiliation from Latin America and the Caribbean. Results: A total of 2030 documents were obtained, showing a sustained growth since 2000. The countries with the highest number of published articles were Brazil with 948 (45.65 %), Mexico with 373 (18.36 %), and Argentina with 274 (13.48 %). Clustering by keywords showed the formation of 3 groups: palliative therapy, palliative therapy in cancer, and age group. Discussion: Although there has been an increase in the number of articles published in recent years, the contribution of each country is unequal, with the first 3 countries accounting for more than 75 % of the total number of publications. National policies and research in palliative care should be promoted with the aim of finding other approaches and therapies for patients requiring palliative care.