Quality Assessment of Anesthesia Videos available on YouTube

Abstract

Previous research indicates patients have limited knowledge regarding anesthesia and the role of medical anesthetists [5]. Research also suggests a majority of patients experience perioperative fear, along with a fear of anesthesia [6]. Achieving patient and public recognition of anesthesia can help lessen fear and anxiety, improving surgical outcomes [5]. Our aim is to determine the quality of YouTube videos related to anesthesia information for patients. YouTube videos were searched utilizing the phrase “How does anesthesia work?” and sorted based on “Relevance” as determined by YouTube. Two medical student graders scored the top 50 videos using a modified DISCERN [8,9] (“mDISCERN”) and a Global Quality Scale (GQS) [8] as quality measurement instruments. The students reached Agreed Upon Total (“AUT”) scores for each video. The mean AUT mDISCERN score was 4.2 with a standard deviation of s=0.9035079. The mean AUT GQS was 3.88 with a standard deviation of s=1.171777. Tests were ran to compare videos in which healthcare providers/facilities were involved in the production (“credentialed”) versus those in which either professionals were not involved, or their involvement was not disclosed (“not credentialed”). Utilizing mDISCERN, there is a higher video quality for “credentialed” videos. However, there was not a statistically significant difference for GQS scores. The scored videos were generally of good quality and did provide useful information to potential patients. Higher quality videos tended to describe the basic science and physiology behind anesthesia and also clearly explained the process of undergoing anesthesia.