What Hundreds of Millions of Patients With Dry Eye Will Find on YouTube: A Quality and Reliability Research of the YouTube Videos

Abstract

Purpose:The aim of this study was to evaluate the demographic features, quality, and reliability of YouTube videos addressing dry eye disease (DED).Methods:The term “dry eye disease” has been searched on YouTube. The first 500 videos that emerged using the defined search term were evaluated. Duplicated-split videos, videos shorter than 60 seconds, videos with a language other than English or videos with an unintelligible English accent, and videos unrelated to DED were excluded. Video uploaders, types, origins, durations, and viewer interactions of the videos were noted. DISCERN, the Global Quality Score, and the Video Quality Score (created by the authors) were used to evaluate the video quality.Results:Of the 500 videos, 262 videos were excluded, and the remaining 238 videos were evaluated. Videos were of moderate quality on all 3 scoring systems. The medical institute and academic society videos had the highest quality (P < 0.05). The quality of videos uploaded by physicians was significantly lower than medical institute and academic society videos and was higher than the others (P < 0.05). User interactions and video duration were weakly positively correlated with the video quality (P < 0.05).Conclusions:Among YouTube videos on DED, only a minority are of good or excellent quality. Videos uploaded by medical institutes or academic societies scored higher in quality than those uploaded by physicians, which, in turn, scored higher than those uploaded by all others. User interactions were weakly correlated with quality values, suggesting user interactions are not good indicators of the quality of YouTube videos on DED.

YouTube as a source of patient information for pterygium surgery

“…The DISCERN, JAMA, and GQS were used to determine the quality and credibility of YouTube videos in our current study, as in many other studies. 11,12 The respective scores were 38.9 ± 10.9 (i.e. poor), 1.8 ± 0.8 (i.e.…”

“…The reliability and quality of YouTube videos on eye diseases and their treatments have been investigated in many studies. [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] Sakalliog ˘lu and Garip 11 have reported in their study on YouTube videos on dry eye that only a small portion of the videos were of good quality, and that the videos of medical institutes and academic centers were of higher quality than the videos of physicians. Bae and Baxter 12 have evaluated YouTube videos on cataract surgery and found them inadequate in terms of patient training.…”

Evaluating YouTube Videos as a High-Quality Educational Resource for Patients Contemplating Receiving Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators

“…Videos uploaded by academic institutions were found to be higher quality than videos uploaded by medical device companies -a finding mirrored in prior YouTube studies. 15,16 One explanation for this disparity could be due to medical device companies not providing additional sources of information nor explaining uncertainty within the procedure, variables that were a part of the modified DISCERN but not the NI scoring system. This is reasonable to expect given that an a medical device company may want to focus on the benefits of a device rather than the complications.…”

“…Based on previous literature, qualitative score cut-offs were implemented for the modified DISCERN criteria: very poor (<9), poor (9-13), average (14)(15)(16)(17), good (18)(19)(20)(21), and excellent (22)(23)(24)(25). 11,12 Qualitative NI score cut-offs were similarly implemented: very poor (0-2.5), poor (2.6-4.0), average (4.1-6.0), good (6.1-8.0), excellent (8.1-10).…”