269 YouTube and gestational diabetes: what are patients watching?

Abstract

Women with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) have enhanced learning requirements and commonly seek online information to augment their learning from health professionals. YouTube is a popular, free, and accessible online resource, which may be particularly useful for individuals with low health literacy. However, the quality and content of videos varies widely; little is known about videos related to GDM. The objective was to systematically evaluate the content and reliability of YouTube videos about GDM. A systematic search of YouTube videos was conducted using four GDM-related keywords. The search display of “relevance” was used to collect videos, replicating a default YouTube search attempt. The first 60 results (3 pages of results) from each keyword search were reviewed (N=240) and each unique video was analyzed. An expert-developed topic list was used to generate a GDM content score to rate video comprehensiveness, and the DISCERN Instrument, a validated metric to assess consumer health information, was used to evaluate the reliability of information presented. Descriptive analysis and intergroup comparisons by video source and quality were conducted. Of 115 unique videos, the average content score was 3.5 out of 7 (SD 2.0), and average DISCERN score was 2.7 (SD 0.7) out of 5, representing low to moderate information comprehensiveness and reliability. Video sources were categorized as personal vlog (10.4%), online education (32.2%), medical (45.2%), business/company (10.4%), and media clip (<1%). DISCERN and content scores (p=0.05 for both) were highest among online education videos and medical videos (Table 1). Video duration was longer for high-quality videos (as defined in Table 2); high- and low-quality videos otherwise had similar views and viewer interactions. While high-quality videos exist, reliability and comprehensiveness were overall low, and higher quality was not associated with increased viewer interaction. Patients using YouTube as a primary source of information on GDM are likely to receive incomplete, and potentially inaccurate, information.View Large Image Figure ViewerDownload Hi-res image Download (PPT)