Objectives:: To identify and analyze the 100 most-cited articles in orthodontics indexed in the Web of Science Category of "Dental, Oral Surgery and Medicine" from 1946 to 2016.
Materials and methods:: On hundred articles were identified in a search of the database of the ISI Web of Science and Journal Citation Reports, applying the truncated search term "orthodon*." Records were manually refined and normalized to unify terms and to remove typographical, transcription, and/or indexing errors.
Results:: The 100 most-cited articles were published between 1946 and 2012, with numbers of citations ranging from 115 to 881. Of the 251 authors participating, 87.65% published a single work, while three authors published four works. Most of the authors with several citations were from the United States, although the University of Oslo produced the highest number of frequently cited works. Most of the articles were clinical studies, and the most frequently cited topic was mini-implants. It was noted that self-citation could be a potential cause of bias in bibliometric analysis.
Conclusions:: This bibliometric citation analysis reveals new, useful, and interesting information about scientific progress in the field of orthodontics.
Keywords: Bibliometrics; Citation analysis; Orthodontics.