Background/aim: Google Trends (Google Inc., USA) is a web-based service that offers data on the time and volume of Google Internet searches. We used Google Trends to identify increases in search traffic caused by cancer campaigns, which are held in October and November each year for breast cancer (BC) and prostate cancer (PC), respectively, in our region. We investigated whether this increase in search traffic coincided with increased research funding or public donations.
Materials and methods: Google searches for PC were compared and scaled against searches for BC from January 2010 to December 2021. The month with the highest volume of search hits for either term was given a relative search volume index of 100. All other months for both search terms were scaled against this index of 100. The degree of government research spending and public donations were contrasted against search traffic.
Results: Search volume increased for both campaign months (49% for BC in October, 5% for PC in November). The mean relative search volume for each campaign's specific month was 72.6 for BC, 18.4 for PC; mean difference of 50.75 (95% confidence interval=42.7-58.8, p<0.001). Annual mean (±standard deviation) expenditure of Government research grants was $22.2 million (± $1.5 million) for BC and $9.7 million (± $2.9 million) for PC with a mean difference of $12.5 million (95% confidence interval=$10.5-14.6 million, p<0.001).
Conclusion: The BC campaign resulted in a statistically significant increase in search traffic compared to that for PC and correlated with statistically significant increases in research spending. Google Trends offers a method of evaluating cancer campaign efficacy and public interest.
Keywords: Google Trends; Prostate cancer; breast cancer; burden of disease; charity; funding.
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