Velmahos Andriana H, Cooley Demidkina Briah, Mitchell Caroline M
Boston University Chobanian and Avedisian School of Medicine, Boston, MA, United States.
Vincent Center for Reproductive Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, United States.
Front Reprod Health. 2025 Feb 28;7:1549331. doi: 10.3389/frph.2025.1549331. eCollection 2025.
There is an increasing tendency to seek health information online rather than through medical professionals. However, the easy accessibility of information online allows for an increased risk of encountering medical misinformation.
We compared descriptions of symptomatology of bacterial vaginosis (BV) on four social media platforms: Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and X (Twitter). We then compared the frequency of discussion of symptoms with patients' report of symptoms in clinically diagnosed BV, vulvovaginal candidiasis and vulvodynia.
Social media was more likely to report burning (45% of posts), itching (45%) or pain (23%) as symptoms of BV than patients (moderate-severe itching 30%, burning 21% or pain 21%). Although pain was reported more often by people with vulvodynia, other symptoms were not different across diagnoses.
Social media overemphasizes the ability of symptoms to allow self-diagnosis of vaginitis, which can lead to delayed treatment, highlighting the need to promote accurate health information online.
人们越来越倾向于通过网络而非医疗专业人员来获取健康信息。然而，网络信息的轻易获取增加了遇到医学错误信息的风险。
我们比较了四个社交媒体平台（照片墙、脸书、优兔和X（推特））上细菌性阴道病（BV）症状学的描述。然后，我们将症状讨论的频率与临床诊断的BV、外阴阴道假丝酵母菌病和外阴痛患者的症状报告进行了比较。
与患者相比（中度至重度瘙痒30%、灼痛21%或疼痛21%），社交媒体更有可能将灼痛（45%的帖子）、瘙痒（45%）或疼痛（23%）报告为BV的症状。虽然外阴痛患者报告疼痛的频率更高，但其他症状在不同诊断中并无差异。
社交媒体过度强调症状进行阴道炎自我诊断的能力，这可能导致治疗延迟，凸显了在网上推广准确健康信息的必要性。
