Department of Clinical and Molecular Medicine, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Rome, Italy.
Eur Rev Med Pharmacol Sci. 2024 May;28(10):3658-3668. doi: 10.26355/eurrev_202405_36303.
Several sociodemographic variables are essential to the complete comprehension of people's health conditions. Also, social determinants of health are decisive in influencing people's health and healthcare strategy outcomes. Nevertheless, the level of awareness of the general population about the social determinants of health still seems poorly investigated. In this scenario, using an infodemiological approach, Google Trends represents a handy tool for monitoring internet-related search activities concerning this specific topic. This study aimed to assess the general population's consciousness about social determinants of health, testing widespread knowledge of these items and evaluating the association of the results obtained through Google-specific search volumes.
Data were collected using the Google Trends tool using several search terms related to food, social problems, and economic issues, which are useful for defining some social determinants of health variables. Descriptive data analysis was performed to show the worldwide Relative Search Volume variations from 1 September 2013 to 31 August 2023. Pearson's correlation analysis tested Relative Search Volumes and later logarithmic transformation. The K-Nearest Neighbors analysis was used to define and assess Relative Search Volumes (RSV) associations.
The results have shown that the general population was mainly interested in topics such as "social support" and "economic burden", showing frequent peaks during the 10 years of the study. According to Pearson's coefficients test, other specific interests and relative correlations emerged regarding social variables (i.e., social support and social problems), food, and financial distress. Moreover, the K-Nearest Neighbors analysis showed that searching activities for "social support", "lack of food", and "social problems" were highly related; for "economic burden", "financial burden", and "out of pocket" suggested the existence of financial distress.
The results of this study underline that social determinants of health are significant barriers to health and well-being and that non-medical factors should be considered more. Healthcare professionals involved in public health should study and understand more about the social determinants of health in relation to health outcomes to provide patient-centered care. Finally, this research suggests that we should encourage and maintain a more comprehensive approach to addressing the health needs of patients and communities, also by an infodemiological assessment.
一些社会人口统计学变量对于全面了解人们的健康状况至关重要。此外，健康的社会决定因素对于影响人们的健康和医疗保健策略结果具有决定性作用。然而，公众对健康的社会决定因素的认识水平似乎仍未得到充分调查。在这种情况下，使用信息流行病学方法，谷歌趋势代表了一种监测与这一特定主题相关的互联网搜索活动的便捷工具。本研究旨在评估一般人群对健康的社会决定因素的意识，检验这些因素的广泛认知，并评估通过谷歌特定搜索量获得的结果之间的关联。
使用谷歌趋势工具收集数据，使用了与食物、社会问题和经济问题相关的几个搜索词，这些词对于定义一些健康的社会决定因素变量很有用。进行描述性数据分析，以显示 2013 年 9 月 1 日至 2023 年 8 月 31 日期间全球相对搜索量的变化。皮尔逊相关分析测试了相对搜索量和对数变换后的相关性。K-最近邻分析用于定义和评估相对搜索量（RSV）的关联。
结果表明，一般人群主要对“社会支持”和“经济负担”等主题感兴趣，在研究的 10 年内频繁出现高峰。根据皮尔逊系数测试，还出现了其他关于社会变量（即社会支持和社会问题）、食物和经济困境的特定兴趣和相对相关性。此外，K-最近邻分析表明，对“社会支持”、“缺乏食物”和“社会问题”的搜索活动高度相关；对“经济负担”、“财政负担”和“自付”的搜索活动表明存在经济困境。
本研究结果强调了健康的社会决定因素是健康和福祉的重要障碍，非医疗因素应该得到更多的考虑。参与公共卫生的医疗保健专业人员应该研究和了解更多关于健康结果的健康的社会决定因素，以提供以患者为中心的护理。最后，这项研究表明，我们应该鼓励并保持更全面的方法来满足患者和社区的健康需求，也可以通过信息流行病学评估来实现。
