TikTok has opened the door to a new era of medical misinformation – and I’m seeing the results in emergency rooms | Amad Butt
IIn the age of the Internet, Googling symptoms and treatments is a common practice for patients, and sometimes even doctors. However, the recent explosion in popularity of podcasts and short-form video content such as TikTok has increased the amount of misinformation in search results to levels never seen before – and this is now having tangible consequences for the concerns patients face. clinics and emergency rooms.
This month’s BBC report around Steven Bartlett’s podcast, The Diary of a CEO, showed it was spreading harmful health misinformation, capturing a broader picture of a moment we’re currently seeing: people are less confident in healthcare professionals and are increasingly relying on videos and other engaging content they see online.
While working in the emergency room, I have seen patients who had heard online that hormone-related diseases such as thyrotoxicosis or diabetes can be treated with herbal and topical therapies. Therefore, they have actively chosen not to take medications, but instead take various supplements or alternative therapies. A quick search reveals why: There are countless videos from wellness influencers who not only advocate for alternative medicines, but also discourage people from using conventional medicines.
One of my colleagues who works in GP practice has had patients come in reporting that they need blood tests to check their magnesium levels, after seeing on TikTok that it is the cause of symptoms such as fatigue, only to find that their levels are normal . This is because magnesium deficiency is often associated with non-specific symptoms, but medical professionals know that this is uncommon in healthy people. It’s clear that people are gaining more control over their health online, and are therefore more likely to use the internet as a source of information on how to treat themselves – this is for the most part an inherently good thing, but what’s worrying is where they extract this information now.
For example, on The Diary or a CEO podcast, there have been guests suggesting that ketogenic diets cure cancer, and others claiming that Covid vaccinations, which saved people millions of livesdid more harm than good. The suggestions may seem ridiculous, but I fear they will be taken seriously by listeners, as Bartlett seems too timid to appropriately challenge the guests he hosts, and not all viewers research the content they watch afterwards get to see. Considered the most popular podcast in the world, The Joe Rogan Experience has seen a plethora of health misinformation scandals. He once suggested that the Covid vaccination was ‘gene therapy’ and has had a significant number of episodes in which his guests talked nonsense about health, indulging in conspiracy theories.
Naomi Klein explained it brilliantly in her 2023 book Doppelganger the concept of diagonalism, the belief that power is linked to conspiracy and how this has permeated everyday life in Western society since the pandemic. Diagonalism, a term coined by William Callison and Quinn Slobodianexplains a shift in the categories of left versus right, but instead shows how people once seen as coming from left-wing or apolitical spheres eventually move towards the far right with the shared belief that power is inherently linked to conspiracy. This kind of widespread conspiracy thinking, which assumes that our lives are controlled by sinister governments and health organizations, has become increasingly common since the pandemic.
Podcasts like Rogan’s or Bartlett’s and their short videos on apps like TikTok have directly fueled this continued rise in misinformation and distrust by featuring guests who often provide atypical medical advice criticizing the status quo of science and medicine.
We now see in the latest reports from the NHS that MMR1 and MMR2 vaccination coverage is at a five-year high. lowest level since 2010. It comes as no surprise that the result has been an increase in measles cases across the country over the past year, which I have seen firsthand in hospital. Fortunately, catch-up programs implemented after these outbreaks in particular showed an increase in uptake in deprived areas. However, I fear that now Robert F. Kennedy Jr. comes into the Trump administration, clips of his vaccine misinformation will continue to spread and spread across the Atlantic Ocean.
The truth is that patients are not responsible for the information they receive online. These are often vulnerable and concerned people, and with the current waiting times being so high and there being little funding available public healthas well as the lack of regulation for this content, I think along with patients. For example, I’m always happy when a patient comes into the hospital having read or heard a suggestion about their health online, because he or she has come to the right people to talk about it, even if they have distrust of healthcare professionals. . I’m also glad that for every pseudo-influencer, there are great health content creators like Dr. Karan Rajan, who uses his platform to bring an evidence-based approach to viewers concerned about their health. Ultimately, TikTok and podcasts have the potential to be a source for effective and useful health guidance, but right now that’s not quite the case.
Without active intervention in regulating the content we see online, with fact-checking, scrutiny, and an increase in public health initiatives to stop the spread of misinformation, this content will continue to rise and impact the health of patients in endanger.