Authors (including presenting author) :
Cheung KY (1), Wong WL (1)
Affiliation :
(1) Physiotherapy Department, Prince of Wales Hospital
Introduction :
Google is the most popular search engine in Hong Kong with market share over 85%. Google Trend is a free online search tool that allows users to review how often specific keywords and phrases have been queried over a specific period of time. Data from Google Trends is known to be update and truthful. Google Trends, as a new source of big data, has already been used to analyze users’ interests across various fields. Knowing patient’s belief is a crucial fundamental of any effective treatment. The Hong Kong data from Google Trends was used to review Hong Kong internet users’ interests in rehabilitation in hope of guiding physiotherapy treatment for better outcomes. As neck pain being one of the most common causes of physiotherapy services, this project focused on internet users’ interests in neck pain rehabilitation.
Objectives :
To explore Hong Kong internet users’ interests in neck pain rehabilitation through studying Google Trend Hong Kong data
Methodology :
The search engine Google Trend was used throughout this project. First, the Cantonese phrase ‘neck pain’ was searched with search region limited to Hong Kong to review overall Hong Kong internet users' interest in neck pain rehabilitation. Second, an time frame was added in the research process to review internet users' interest in neck pain rehabilitation in specific years. The most searched related terms within the corresponding years were recorded and analyzed by calculating the mean values of the search rate with annual time frame set between 2014 to 2018 respectively. Third, comparison between mean values of the most searched related terms in each year was done to review overall changes of trend of internet users’ interests in neck pain rehabilitation.
Result & Outcome :
Within each individual year searched, the treatment-specific related terms ‘massage’ and ‘exercise’ were persistently shown at the top tier of google most searched related terms. Despite both searched terms ‘massage’ and ‘exercise ’illustrated an increment in search rate over the searched 5 year peroid, 'massage' was consistently at the top of google most searched related terms followed by 'exercise', which was fluctuating along the most searched related terms. Such findings indicated that the internet users’ interests in neck pain rehabilitation lies in passive treatment over active treatment. This finding is alerting as active exercise has been well supported in literature to be more effective in successful rehabilitation among a wide range of musculoskeletal conditions including neck pain. This project implies the need of further motivation of patients on active exercise to enhance rehabilitation outcomes in future.
Co-location with:
