Characterization of Reddit Posts About Xylazine-Associated Wounds: Qualitative Study.

Q3 Medicine
JMIR dermatology Pub Date : 2025-09-12 DOI:10.2196/70329
Anthony Spadaro, JaMor Hairston, Sahithi Lakamana, Rachel Wightman, Jennifer Love, Jeanmarie Perrone, Abeed Sarker
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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background: Xylazine has been associated with skin wounds. The rising prevalence of xylazine and its debated role in wound causation have sparked concerns among public health professionals, medical experts, and people who use drugs.

Objective: This study used a qualitative evaluation of Reddit posts to understand the experiences of people who use drugs concerning xylazine-associated wounds.

Methods: This study explored xylazine discussions on Reddit. Data were collected from 930+ drug-related subreddits via the PRAW Python application programming interface, and natural language processing methods were employed to identify posts that mentioned xylazine and wound-related keywords. Retrieved posts were manually coded for thematic analysis, and a term frequency-inverse document frequency analysis was performed per theme to obtain additional insights.

Results: The manual classification of 286 posts revealed predominant themes related to the pathophysiology of xylazine, wound locations on the body, and management strategies. The 3 most frequent xylazine wound-related themes were "Mechanisms of xylazine-associated wounds" (84 posts, 29.4%), "Geographic region" (67, 23.4%), and "Location of wounds on the body" (56, 19.6%). The analysis showed xylazine's presence in the discussions among Reddit's drug-using communities, with a notable focus on wound management and geographic trends. The term frequency-inverse document frequency analysis revealed prominent lexical markers within each theme.

Conclusions: The findings suggest that social media platforms such as Reddit can serve as valuable resources for understanding emerging health issues such as xylazine-associated wounds. The study's findings highlight patterns of use, the characteristics of wounds on people who use drugs, and discussions about wound management. This study adds to a growing body of literature using social media to understand the consequences of emerging drugs on human health.

Abstract Image

关于xylazine相关伤口的Reddit帖子的特征:定性研究。
背景:噻嗪与皮肤创伤有关。氯嗪的流行率不断上升,其在伤口病因中的作用备受争议,这引起了公共卫生专业人员、医学专家和吸毒者的关注。目的:本研究对Reddit帖子进行定性评价,以了解使用氯嗪相关伤口药物的人的经历。方法:本研究对Reddit上关于xylazine的讨论进行了调查。通过PRAW Python应用程序编程接口从930多个药物相关子reddit中收集数据,并采用自然语言处理方法识别涉及xylazine和伤口相关关键词的帖子。检索到的帖子被手动编码以进行主题分析,并且对每个主题执行术语频率逆文档频率分析,以获得更多的见解。结果:286个岗位的人工分类揭示了与二甲肼的病理生理、身体伤口位置和处理策略相关的主要主题。最常见的3个与木嗪相关的主题是“木嗪相关伤口的机制”(84篇,29.4%)、“地理区域”(67篇,23.4%)和“伤口在身体上的位置”(56篇,19.6%)。分析显示,在Reddit吸毒社区的讨论中存在xylazine,并特别关注伤口管理和地理趋势。术语频率逆文档频率分析揭示了每个主题中突出的词汇标记。结论:研究结果表明,Reddit等社交媒体平台可以作为了解新出现的健康问题的宝贵资源,如与木嗪相关的伤口。该研究的发现突出了使用模式、吸毒者伤口的特征以及关于伤口管理的讨论。越来越多的文献利用社交媒体来了解新兴药物对人类健康的影响,这项研究增加了这些文献的数量。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
CiteScore
1.20
自引率
0.00%
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审稿时长
18 weeks
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