Online Discourse and Trends Surrounding HPV Vaccination for Head and Neck Cancer Prevention.

Résumé

OBJECTIVE: In 2020, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Merck's GARDASIL 9 for prevention of certain human papillomavirus (HPV)-related head and neck cancer. This study characterizes the sentiment and themes of HPV vaccination online discourse surrounding the 2020 FDA recommendation.STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective cohort.SETTING: Data from 2018 to 2022: Reddit, Teen VaxView (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), and Google Trends.METHODS: Online public discourse was assessed by searching Reddit for user submitted posts using relevant keywords. Reddit posts were categorized by a trained machine learning classifier. Natural language processing calculated positive/negative sentiment, polarity, and frequent nonstop words. Google Trends assessed relative search popularity, and TeenVaxView assessed HPV vaccinations among adolescents. Statistical relationships were assessed using linear and logarithmic regression models.RESULTS: Analysis of 2751 Reddit posts demonstrated a balanced overall positive/negative sentiment, with a substantial positive trend over the study period (P = .05). Most posts were personal stories/questions (n = 1997, 72.6%) and conspiracy posts made up a just a small minority (n = 186, 6.8%). Discussion including head and neck anatomical and cancer terms significantly increased (P = .01). Vaccination coverage trended upward significantly for males and females (P