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Is TikTok a high-quality source of information on thyroid cancer?

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Abstract

Purpose

Increased Internet users tend to use online video platforms as a source of medical information. There are many thyroid cancer-related videos on TikTok, the most popular short-video application in China. However, quality evaluation of these videos remains absent. The aim of this study is to evaluate the quality of thyroid cancer-related videos on TikTok.

Methods

A search was performed on TikTok with the keyword “thyroid cancer”. The top 100 videos in the search results were selected. Characteristics of videos including video length, duration on TikTok, thumbs up, thumbs up/day, comments, comments/day, favorites, favorites/day, reposts, and reposts/day were collected. The Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool (PEMAT), modified DISCERN (mDISCERN), Video Information and Quality Index (VIQI), and Global Quality Score (GQS) were applied to assess the quality of videos.

Results

Among the 100 videos in this study, most were uploaded by surgical physicians (n = 50), and the most common topic was anatomy/basic facts (n = 21). The mean scores of the PEMAT, PEMAT-U, and PEMAT-A were 71.18 ± 16.56, 82.23 ± 15.00, and 44.00 ± 37.57, respectively. Among the five questions of the mDISCERN tool, 71, 90, 82, 9, and 28 videos were evaluated as “yes”, respectively. The mean scores of mDISCERN, VIQI, and GQS were 2.80 ± 1.03, 14.87 ± 2.27, and 3.72 ± 1.00, respectively. The characteristics and quality of videos are significantly different based on the uploader and content.

Conclusions

The quality of thyroid cancer information on TikTok is unsatisfactory. There is a need for high-quality thyroid cancer-related information on short-video platforms for patient education.

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Funding

This study is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32071436) and the Beijing Municipal Natural Science Foundation (7222127).

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Shijie Yang, Jing Zhan

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of General Surgery, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China

    Shijie Yang & Xiequn Xu

  2. Department of Radiation Oncology, National Cancer Center/National Clinical Research Center for Cancer/Cancer Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China

    Shijie Yang

  3. Department of Anesthesiology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China

    Jing Zhan

Authors
  1. Shijie Yang
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Contributions

Conceptualization: X.X.; methodology: S.Y., J.Z.; formal analysis and investigation: S.Y., J.Z.; writing - original draft preparation: S.Y., J.Z.; writing - review and editing: X.X.

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Correspondence to Xiequn Xu.

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Yang, S., Zhan, J. & Xu, X. Is TikTok a high-quality source of information on thyroid cancer?. Endocrine 81, 270–276 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-023-03332-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-023-03332-8

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