Original article
What do people post on social media relative to low back pain? A content analysis of Australian data

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msksp.2021.102402Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Social media posts provide a snapshot of what is important for people with low back pain.

  • Social media analysis provides access to a perspective that people may not otherwise disclose.

  • People with low back pain seem to seek validation from their social network.

  • Yet, in most cases, there are no public responses to posts on social media about low back pain.

  • It seems necessary to address this discrepancy to deliver patient-centred care effectively.

Abstract

Objective

Low back pain is the leading contributor to the global disability burden. The Global Spine Care Initiative (GSCI) recommend patient-centred care to stem the cost of low back pain. One way to enhance patient-centred care is by better understanding what is relevant for people with low back pain. Exploring social media posts about low back pain could offer this insight and provide valuable information for health care professionals to facilitate active participation in patient-centred care.

Methods

We used an inductive content analysis method. In the form of social media posts, data on Twitter and Instagram were collected from June to August 2018. The posts were geo-targeted to Australia. We recorded the number of status broadcasts that contained a low back pain keyword and responses. We developed a codebook to describe the data and applied it to identify low back pain themes.

Results

We analysed 768 posts containing 457 status broadcasts and 311 responses. Almost half (49%) of status broadcasts about low back pain seemed to seek validation. Expressing sympathy (31%) was the most common response to a status broadcast about low back pain. There were no public responses to 76% of status broadcasts about low back pain. Our analysis yielded two core themes, “hear my pain” and “I feel for you".

Conclusions

Posts about low back pain on social media often seem to suggest that the person posting is seeking validation. Responses typically express sympathy or a shared experience; yet, there is no response to most social media posts about low back pain.

Section snippets

Background

Low back pain is the main contributor to the global disability burden (Hoy et al., 2014). Over the last decade, low back pain has consistently been the leading cause of disability worldwide (GBD 2019 Diseases and Injuries Collaborators, 2020; Hartvigsen et al., 2018). To stem the rising cost of low back pain, 66 experts from 24 different countries formed the Global Spine Care Initiative (GSCI) to define principles for the delivery of evidence-based care for spine pain and disability globally (

Ethics and safety

This study was approved by our institutions Human Research Ethics Committee prior to data collection (approval number 180098).

Researcher characteristics

The analysis was conducted by a team of authors interested in providing education to treat low back pain. The authors include physiotherapists, physiotherapy researchers, a public health researcher, a qualitative researcher, a rheumatologist, an orthopaedic surgeon, and a psychologist. This study was part of the first author's (EO) doctoral studies. EO is a

Data collection

The data collection period was from June 18th, 2018, to August 22nd, 2018 (66 days).

Descriptive statistics

Table 1 describes the sample. We were not able to access any posts from Facebook due to privacy restrictions. The average number of responses to a status broadcast about low back pain was 3 (standard deviation(sd) 3). One status broadcast generated 167 responses, so this data was not included in Table 1 and analysed separately (Appendix C).

Social influence

In total, the status broadcasters had 4,713,584 followers. On average,

Main findings

Our analysis yielded two core themes that highlight several important findings. The first theme, “Hear my pain”, suggests that people with low back pain appear to use social media as an outlet for support, that is, to seek validation and to share their experiences. The second theme, “I feel for you”, suggests that social media is used to share support for people with low back pain. A third main finding relates to what was unsaid, in that there were no public responses to 76% of the status

Conclusions

Posts on social media concerning low back pain are most commonly seeking validation. Where there are responses, the responses typically express sympathy or a shared experience, but in most cases, there are no responses at all. These findings provide insights to improve clinical communication to promote patient-centred care.

Funding

This research project did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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