Medical and Health-Related Misinformation on Social Media: Bibliometric Study of the Scientific Literature

Yeung, Andy Wai Kan; Tosevska, Anela; Klager, Elisabeth; Eibensteiner, Fabian; Tsagkaris, Christos; Parvanov, Emil D.; Nawaz, Faisal A.; Völkl-Kernstock, Sabine; Schaden, Eva; Kletečka-Pulker, Maria; Willschke, Harald; Atanasov, Atanas G.

doi:10.2196/28152

Cited by 89 publications

(59 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Among the small number of campaigns seeking assistance for alternative treatments and to oppose mandates, the majority (71/133, 53%) contained verified false information about COVID-19. These findings are novel in the literature for crowdfunding and verify the trends occurring amid the infodemic across other social media sites and the popular reporting on GoFundMe [20,21,[40][41][42].…”

Section: Principal Resultssupporting

confidence: 71%

COVID-19 Misinformation and Social Network Crowdfunding: Cross-sectional Study of Alternative Treatments and Antivaccine Mandates

Shaw¹,

Hakam²,

Lui³

et al. 2022

J Med Internet Res

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Background Crowdfunding is increasingly used to offset the financial burdens of illness and health care. In the era of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated infodemic, the role of crowdfunding to support controversial COVID-19 stances is unknown. Objective We sought to examine COVID-19–related crowdfunding focusing on the funding of alternative treatments not endorsed by major medical entities, including campaigns with an explicit antivaccine, antimask, or antihealth care stances. Methods We performed a cross-sectional analysis of GoFundMe campaigns for individuals requesting donations for COVID-19 relief. Campaigns were identified by key word and manual review to categorize campaigns into “Traditional treatments,” “Alternative treatments,” “Business-related,” “Mandate,” “First Response,” and “General.” For each campaign, we extracted basic narrative, engagement, and financial variables. Among those that were manually reviewed, the additional variables of “mandate type,” “mandate stance,” and presence of COVID-19 misinformation within the campaign narrative were also included. COVID-19 misinformation was defined as “false or misleading statements,” where cited evidence could be provided to refute the claim. Descriptive statistics were used to characterize the study cohort. Results A total of 30,368 campaigns met the criteria for final analysis. After manual review, we identified 53 campaigns (0.17%) seeking funding for alternative medical treatment for COVID-19, including popularized treatments such as ivermectin (n=14, 26%), hydroxychloroquine (n=6, 11%), and vitamin D (n=4, 7.5%). Moreover, 23 (43%) of the 53 campaigns seeking support for alternative treatments contained COVID-19 misinformation. There were 80 campaigns that opposed mandating masks or vaccination, 48 (60%) of which contained COVID-19 misinformation. Alternative treatment campaigns had a lower median amount raised (US $1135) compared to traditional (US $2828) treatments (P<.001) and a lower median percentile of target achieved (11.9% vs 31.1%; P=.003). Campaigns for alternative treatments raised substantially lower amounts (US $115,000 vs US $52,715,000, respectively) and lower proportions of fundraising goals (2.1% vs 12.5%) for alternative versus conventional campaigns. The median goal for campaigns was significantly higher (US $25,000 vs US $10,000) for campaigns opposing mask or vaccine mandates relative to those in support of upholding mandates (P=.04). Campaigns seeking funding to lift mandates on health care workers reached US $622 (0.15%) out of a US $410,000 goal. Conclusions A small minority of web-based crowdfunding campaigns for COVID-19 were directed at unproven COVID-19 treatments and support for campaigns aimed against masking or vaccine mandates. Approximately half (71/133, 53%) of these campaigns contained verifiably false or misleading information and had limited fundraising success. International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) RR2-10.1001/jamainternmed.2019.3330

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Section: Principal Resultssupporting

confidence: 71%

COVID-19 Misinformation and Social Network Crowdfunding: Cross-sectional Study of Alternative Treatments and Antivaccine Mandates

Shaw¹,

Hakam²,

Lui³

et al. 2022

J Med Internet Res

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“…The role of media and social media Misinformation about health-related topics is abundant on social media, [106][107][108][109] and contraception is not an exception. 110 A study of .838,000 Twitter messages on contraceptives posted between March 2006, when Twitter was founded, and the end of 2019, found that the number of tweets during this time increased by almost 300-fold.…”

Section: Areas Of Uncertaintymentioning

confidence: 99%

Emergency Contraception: Access and Challenges at Times of Uncertainty

Stein¹,

Deverakonda²,

Katz

et al. 2022

American Journal of Therapeutics

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Background:The UN Commission on Life-Saving Commodities for Women and Children identified emergency contraceptive pills as 1 of the 13 essential underused, low-cost, and high-impact commodities that could save the lives of millions of women and children worldwide. In the US, 2 emergency contraceptive regimens are currently approved, and their most plausible mechanism of action involves delaying and/or inhibiting ovulation.Areas of uncertainty:Abortion and contraception are recognized as essential components of reproductive health care. In the US, in the wake of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization Supreme Court decision on June 24, 2022, 26 states began to or are expected to severely restrict abortion. It is anticipated that these restrictions will increase the demand for emergency contraception (EC). Several obstacles to EC access have been described, and these include cost, hurdles to over-the-counter purchase, low awareness, myths about their mechanisms of action, widespread misinformation, and barriers that special populations face in accessing them. The politicization of EC is a major factor limiting access. Improving sex education and health literacy, along with eHealth literacy, are important initiatives to improve EC uptake and access.Data Sources:PubMed, The Guttmacher Institute, Society of Family Planning, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the World Health Organization, The United Nations.Therapeutic Advances:A randomized noninferiority trial showed that the 52 mg levonorgestrel intrauterine device was noninferior to the copper intrauterine device when used as an EC method in the first 5 days after unprotected intercourse. This is a promising and highly effective emergency contraceptive option, particularly for overweight and obese patients, and a contraceptive option with a different bleeding profile than the copper intrauterine device.Conclusions:EC represents an important facet of medicine and public health. The 2 medical regimens currently approved in the US are very effective, have virtually no medical contraindications, and novel formulations are actively being investigated to make them more convenient and effective for all patient populations. Barriers to accessing EC, including the widespread presence of contraception deserts, threaten to broaden and accentuate the already existing inequities and disparities in society, at a time when they have reached the dimensions of a public health crisis.

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“…Nonetheless, students and clinicians have already been widely consulting YouTube as a learning tool, such that it is the most frequently used educational video source for anatomical knowledge [ 12 ] and medical surgery preparation [ 13 ]. Being open access and having non-peer-reviewed user-contributed contents, YouTube contains very good materials for healthcare education, but also potentially much misinformation/inaccurate information [ 14 , 15 ]. A recent literature review has reported that online social platforms could positively affect anatomy education, with YouTube being the most investigated platform followed by Facebook and Twitter [ 16 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Content Analysis of YouTube Videos That Demonstrate Panoramic Radiography

Grillon

Yeung

2022

Healthcare

Self Cite

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In this digital era, dental students often search for online resources for self-directed learning. YouTube is one of the most commonly sought online platforms for educational or instructional videos. No prior study has examined the validity of panoramic radiography videos available on YouTube. This study provides a content analysis of these YouTube videos. A search for relevant YouTube videos was conducted in April 2022. The search string was: (panoramic OR pan OR OPG) AND (dental OR dentistry OR X-ray). The first 100 videos that resulted from the search and their related videos were screened. Exclusion criteria included irrelevance (e.g., no demonstration of panoramic radiography procedures) and non-English videos. For each included video, the following parameters were recorded: image receptor type, patient age, patient type (real patient, animation, or phantom head), patient preparation procedures, machine preparation, patient positioning, and operator safety. The number of views, comments, likes, and channel subscribers were recorded, as well as the video duration and the age of the video. Forty videos were included and analyzed. Most of the videos demonstrated digital panoramic radiography with an adult patient. Procedures on the patient and machine preparations as well as patient positioning were generally explained well. However, most videos did not well-demonstrate operator safety details concerning the use of adequate personal protective equipment. View count, comment count, and channel subscriber count positively correlated with the like count. Clinicians and students should carefully critique the content of such instructional videos and refer to the contents from other sources such as user manuals and latest recommendations from local authorities.

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Medical and Health-Related Misinformation on Social Media: Bibliometric Study of the Scientific Literature

Cited by 89 publications

References 62 publications

COVID-19 Misinformation and Social Network Crowdfunding: Cross-sectional Study of Alternative Treatments and Antivaccine Mandates

COVID-19 Misinformation and Social Network Crowdfunding: Cross-sectional Study of Alternative Treatments and Antivaccine Mandates

Emergency Contraception: Access and Challenges at Times of Uncertainty

Content Analysis of YouTube Videos That Demonstrate Panoramic Radiography

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