Social media platforms have become an essential part of our daily lives. While YouTube and Facebook continue to dominate the online landscape, Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok have become the favorite social media platforms in the younger generation. TikTok, an app that allows users to create and share 15-s videos, is one of the fastest-growing social media platforms. Currently, almost half of young adults aged <30 years uses TikTok, and it has accumulated >1.1 billion active users worldwide [1].

In this issue of BJUI, the study by Xu et al. [2] investigated the misinformation and quality of information of prostate cancer-related videos on TikTok. A total of 55 TikTok videos with the hashtag #prostatecancer were reviewed and analysed. Although the videos had accumulated 134 944 individual views, the vast majority of them (98.2%) were of moderate to poor quality. Among the videos that provided objective information, 41% of them contained a significant amount of misinformation. Moreover, 10.1% of all videos had an apparent commercial bias. These results are worrisome, as the receipt of biased and false information can potentially influence the health-seeking behaviour of our patients.

People ‘surf’ the web to gather information about uro-oncological diseases and the trap of ‘fake news’ is always around the corner [3]. In fact, dissemination of misinformation and poor-quality information on social media platforms are very common. This has been demonstrated consistently across different urological conditions on various social media platforms [4]. This is particularly concerning when contents with poor quality tend to attract more public engagement [4]. While it is difficult to establish laws to regulate the usage of social media for healthcare-related contents, we should think of ways to utilise social media in an appropriate and positive manner.

As healthcare professionals, we should ensure high-quality information can be delivered to our urological patients. In this rapidly evolving digital era, we have to understand the immense potentials of social media and learn how to use it wisely. Social media platforms differ by their users’ demographics and their styles of communication and interaction. The choice of social media platforms greatly depends on our target audience and the purpose of our social media activities. For example, Instagram may be a good platform for raising awareness of testicular cancer in young men, whereas Twitter may be a better platform for sharing experiences and exchanging medical knowledge among urologists. Creating contents that can yield maximal engagement is a skill that requires learning and a certain degree of expertise [5]. Social media analytics may also help us understand how we can reach our audience more effectively [6].

The general public and our urological patients should be educated on the possibility of encountering low-quality information and even misinformation on social media platforms. Urological associations, professional bodies, institutions and hospitals could also play an active role in the dissemination of high-quality urological information. The European Association of Urology (EAU) has established the EAU Patient Information portal (https://patients.uroweb.org) for patients to access reliable information on various urological conditions. The Urology Care Foundation (https://www.urologyhealth.org), the Official Foundation of the American Urological Association (AUA), has also produced numerous patient-education materials based on the AUA Clinical Guidelines. These are valuable materials that can be actively disseminated to the general public and patients who are in need of urological care. Misinformation in urology is a genuine problem and we must try our best to resolve it.

社交媒体平台已成为我们日常生活的重要组成部分。在 YouTube 和 Facebook 继续主导在线格局的同时，Instagram、Snapchat 和 TikTok 已成为年轻一代最喜欢的社交媒体平台。TikTok 是一款允许用户创建和分享 15 秒视频的应用程序，是增长最快的社交媒体平台之一。目前，近一半<30岁的年轻人使用TikTok，全球累计活跃用户超过11亿[ 1 ]。

在本期BJUI 中，Xu等人的研究。[ 2 ] 调查了 TikTok 上前列腺癌相关视频的错误信息和信息质量。总共审查和分析了 55 个带有 #prostatecancer 标签的 TikTok 视频。虽然这些影片已累积 134 944 次个人观看，但其中绝大多数 (98.2%) 的质量中等至较差。在提供客观信息的视频中，41% 的视频包含大量错误信息。此外，所有视频中有 10.1% 有明显的商业偏见。这些结果令人担忧，因为收到有偏见和虚假的信息可能会影响我们患者的求医行为。

人们在网上“冲浪”以收集有关泌尿肿瘤疾病的信息，而“假新闻”的陷阱总是迫在眉睫 [ 3 ]。事实上，在社交媒体平台上传播错误信息和低质量信息非常普遍。这已经在各种社交媒体平台上的不同泌尿系统疾病中得到一致证明 [ 4 ]。当质量差的内容往往会吸引更多公众参与时，这一点尤其令人担忧 [ 4 ]。虽然很难制定法律来规范医疗保健相关内容的社交媒体使用，但我们应该想办法以适当和积极的方式利用社交媒体。

作为医疗保健专业人员，我们应该确保向泌尿外科患者提供高质量的信息。在这个快速发展的数字时代，我们必须了解社交媒体的巨大潜力并学习如何明智地使用它。社交媒体平台因用户的人口统计数据以及他们的交流和互动方式而异。社交媒体平台的选择在很大程度上取决于我们的目标受众和我们社交媒体活动的目的。例如，Instagram 可能是一个很好的平台，可以提高年轻男性对睾丸癌的认识，而 Twitter 可能是一个更好的平台，可以在泌尿科医生之间分享经验和交流医学知识。创建可以产生最大参与度的内容是一项需要学习和一定程度的专业知识的技能 [ 5]。社交媒体分析还可以帮助我们了解如何更有效地接触受众 [ 6 ]。

应该教育公众和我们的泌尿外科患者在社交媒体平台上遇到低质量信息甚至错误信息的可能性。泌尿外科协会、专业团体、机构和医院也可以在传播高质量泌尿外科信息方面发挥积极作用。欧洲泌尿外科协会 (EAU) 建立了 EAU 患者信息门户 (https://patients.uroweb.org)，供患者访问有关各种泌尿系统疾病的可靠信息。美国泌尿外科协会 (AUA) 的官方基金会泌尿外科护理基金会 (https://www.urologyhealth.org) 也根据 AUA 临床指南制作了大量患者教育材料。这些是有价值的材料，可以积极传播给普通大众和需要泌尿外科护理的患者。泌尿外科的错误信息是一个真正的问题，我们必须尽力解决。