(121) Cross Sectional Analysis of Otolaryngology TikTok Content

Introduction: TikTok has gained popularity as a social media platform for laypeople, healthcare providers, academic institutions, and students to disseminate healthcare-related information through the use of audiovisual segments of limited duration. This is a novel study designed to characterize the landscape of otolaryngological content on TikTok and assess factors that correlate to video popularity.

Methods: We created a new TikTok account and used the term “#Otolaryngology” on November 21st, 2022 for our search. The top 100 videos that met the inclusion criteria were analyzed. We collected data on account characteristics, video content, and video characteristics. We performed linear regression on IBM SPSS to assess the relationship of these factors to the number of likes on the post.

Results: The top 100 videos in our search of Otolaryngology content on TikTok had a total of 1131540 likes and 20189 comments. On average, each post had 11315 ± 34002 likes. The average duration of a post was 33.5 ± 33.9 seconds. The majority of the top 100 video content was either educational (n=48, 48%) or entertaining (n=21, 21%). Posts published by non-physician health care providers were correlated to a greater number of likes (β = 64348 ± 13494; P < 0.001) compared to those published by institutions, non-health care providers, other physicians, and otolaryngologists. There was no association between video content, video length, or use of audio and video popularity. Posts by accounts with more followers were correlated to greater likes (β = 42.8 ± 7.8; P < 0.001).

Conclusions: Otolaryngology content is popular and prevalent on TikTok. Interestingly, the most popular posts were created by non-physician health care providers with large followings. Given the widespread reach of the platform, strategic partnership with content creators with these attributes would optimize visibility of certain video topics related to otolaryngology.