Social media as an information source for pediatric musculoskeletal infections: a quality analysis of English language content.

Abstract

Social media is an accessible information source for patients and families but data on its educational veracity for pediatric musculoskeletal infections are limited. We aim to explore this gap by quantifying information quality on three social media platforms for two infections: acute hematogenous osteomyelitis and septic arthritis. Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram were searched using the keywords 'acute hematogenous osteomyelitis' and 'septic arthritis'. Four raters with medical backgrounds evaluated posts using the modified DISCERN 16-point scoring system to quantify educational value. The intraclass correlation coefficient measured the reviewers' agreement, group differences were analyzed using Kruskal-Wallis and Wilcox-rank sum tests, and predictors for DISCERN scoring were calculated with linear regression. Pairwise comparisons among septic arthritis posts showed higher scores with YouTube ( n  = 50, 45.41 ± 12.44) than for Facebook ( n  = 34, 32.70 ± 8.73) and Instagram ( n  = 100, 24.71 ± 4.68) ( P  < 0.001). For osteomyelitis, pairwise comparisons showed higher scores for YouTube ( n  = 50, 46.62 ± 6.29) versus Facebook ( n  = 19, 37.95 ± 9.69) and Instagram posts ( n  = 100, 36.14 ± 6.16) ( P  < 0.001). When aggregating infections, YouTube had the highest DISCERN score (46.01 ± 9.83) followed by Facebook (34.58 ± 9.35) and Instagram (30.42 ± 7.91); all pairwise comparisons were significantly different (all P  < 0.001). Across all posts, authorship from medical institutions was associated with higher DISCERN scoring ( P  < 0.001). Social media lacks educational veracity for pediatric musculoskeletal infections. Patients using social media as an information source for these diseases should preferentially gather information from medical institutions.