Virtual Reality Application in Anatomy Education: A Bibliometric Analysis and Future Direction

Virtual reality (VR) has recently been a prominent study area. However, no published bibliometric studies have assessed the relevant scientific literature covering these tools in anatomy education. This study aims to locate and assess the scientific literature on VR in anatomy education, revealing the development of publishing, significant authors, scientific journals, and nations. In addition, we aimed to identify and characterize the anatomy education field and subjects most frequently addressed by researchers. We looked for pertinent papers on VR research in anatomy education in the Scopus electronic database. First, basic publishing and citation data were gathered using the Scopus database's “Search document” functions within the title article, abstract, and keyword. For subsequent analysis, the paper's complete bibliographic data were exported to the bibliometric software package VOSviewer. Finally, the researcher created visualization maps to draw attention to the frequently occurring words and phrases in the titles and abstracts. Based on data from 990 articles, this study suggests that the growth development in Virtual reality with the most significant Scopus index occurred in 1998, which reached 190.90 percent. The Studies in Health technology and informatics journal is the most international publications in Virtual reality in anatomy with 98 documents. The anatomical sciences education journal is the most influential, with 1114 citations. United States is the country that has the most research papers on Virtual reality in anatomy, while Silverstein J.C is the most prolific writer on Virtual Reality in anatomy teaching. The Virtual Reality in anatomy field development map based on co-occurrence is classified into seven clusters, and “virtual reality” is the most highlighted term not only in cluster 1 but throughout the entire network. The bibliometric analysis indisputably indicates the many growing anatomy education uses of VR. We expect it to have a significant influence on anatomy education as the technology continues to grow and becomes more accessible in nations with VR research.