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

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.

Keywords: Health information; Quality; Thyroid cancer; TikTok; Video.