Purpose

We aimed to evaluate recent Instagram and Twitter posts to identify the primary disseminators of information related to radiation therapy on social media (health care professionals vs patients), to characterize their influencer status, and to characterize the content of this information.

Methods and Materials

Using 2 commercial hashtag analytics platforms, 1000 of the most recent eligible posts from each platform were evaluated for content, tone, and engagement, as well as user (poster) characteristics. Inclusion criteria were as follows: unique posts, written in English, relevant to human cancer treatment, and containing 1 of 11 predetermined hashtags (#radiation, #radiotherapy, #radiationtherapy, #radiationoncology, #radonc, #radiationtherapist #radiationtreatment, #medphys, #cyberknife, #radiosurgery, #protontherapy).

Results

Users of radiation oncology content on Instagram were primarily patients/caregivers (47%), specifically adult patients (94%) with breast cancer (53%). Patient/caregiver content was focused on patient experience (79%), with approximately half specific to radiation therapy (51%), and most patient/caregiver posts demonstrated a positive tone (86%). In contrast, Twitter content was dominated by health care professionals (53%), specifically within radiation oncology (90% of unique users). Health care professional content was focused on colleague education/research dissemination (53%), with a high proportion of posts specific to radiation therapy (95%).

Conclusions

Given the disproportionate number of patients versus radiation oncology professionals active on Instagram versus Twitter, and the lack of radiation therapy-specific content on Instagram, there may be an opportunity to improve patient outreach and education by promoting the presence of radiation oncologists on Instagram.

中文翻译：

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#TrendingNow：放射肿瘤学患者和专业人员之间的 Instagram 与 Twitter 活动

目的

我们旨在评估最近的 Instagram 和 Twitter 帖子，以确定社交媒体上放射治疗相关信息的主要传播者（医疗保健专业人员与患者），描述他们的影响者地位，并描述这些信息的内容。

方法和材料

使用 2 个商业标签分析平台，对来自每个平台的 1000 个最新合格帖子的内容、语气和参与度以及用户（海报）特征进行了评估。入选标准如下：用英文撰写的与人类癌症治疗相关的独特帖子，并包含 11 个预先确定的主题标签中的 1 个（#radiation、#radiotherapy、#radiationtherapy、#radiationoncology、#radonc、#radiationtherapist #radiationtreatment、#medphys、 #cyberknife、#radiosurgery、#protontherapy）。

结果

Instagram 上放射肿瘤学内容的用户主要是患者/护理人员 (47%)，特别是患有乳腺癌的成年患者 (94%) (53%)。患者/护理人员的内容侧重于患者体验 (79%)，其中大约一半专门针对放射治疗 (51%)，并且大多数患者/护理人员的帖子表现出积极的语气 (86%)。相比之下，Twitter 内容由医疗保健专业人员 (53%) 主导，特别是在放射肿瘤学领域 (90% 的独特用户)。医疗保健专业内容侧重于同事教育/研究传播 (53%)，其中很大比例的帖子专门针对放射治疗 (95%)。

结论

鉴于活跃在 Instagram 和 Twitter 上的患者与放射肿瘤学专业人员的数量不成比例，并且 Instagram 上缺乏特定于放射治疗的内容，因此可能有机会通过在 Instagram 上宣传放射肿瘤学家的存在来改善患者的外展和教育。