title: YouTube as an information source for pediatric adenotonsillectomy and ear tube surgery.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Assess the overall quality of information on adenotonsillectomy and ear tube surgery presented on YouTube (www.youtube.com) from the perspective of a parent or patient searching for information on surgery.
  
  
  METHODS
  The YouTube website was systematically searched on select dates with a formal search strategy to identify videos pertaining to pediatric adenotonsillectomy and ear tube surgery. Only videos with at least 5 (ear tube surgery) or 10 (adenotonsillectomy) views per day were included. Each video was viewed and scored by two independent scorers. Videos were categorized by goal and scored for video/audio quality, accuracy, comprehensiveness, and procedure-specific content.
  
  
  METHODS
  Cross-sectional study.
  
  
  METHODS
  Public domain website.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Fifty-five videos were scored for adenotonsillectomy and forty-seven for ear tube surgery. The most common category was educational (65.3%) followed by testimonial (28.4%), and news program (9.8%). Testimonials were more common for adenotonsillectomy than ear tube surgery (41.8% vs. 12.8%, p=0.001). Testimonials had a significantly lower mean accuracy (2.23 vs. 2.62, p=0.02), comprehensiveness (1.71 vs. 2.22, p=0.007), and TA specific content (0.64 vs. 1.69, p=0.001) score than educational type videos. Only six videos (5.9%) received high scores in both video/audio quality and accuracy/comprehensiveness of content. There was no significant association between the accuracy and comprehensive score and views, posted "likes", posted "dislikes", and likes/dislikes ratio. There was an association between "likes" and mean video quality (Spearman's rho=0.262, p=0.008).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Parents/patients searching YouTube for information on pediatric adenotonsillectomy and ear tube surgery will generally encounter low quality information with testimonials being common but of significantly lower quality. Viewer perceived quality ("likes") did not correlate to formally scored content quality.
authors: Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD, United States; Department of Surgery, University of Nevada School of Medicine, 2040 Charleston Building, #302, Las Vegas, NV 89102, United States.
authors: Jeffrey A
authors: JA
authors: Sorensen
authors: Department of Otolaryngology, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Bethesda, MD 20889, United States.
authors: Max D
authors: MD
authors: Pusz
authors: Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD, United States; Department of Otolaryngology, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Bethesda, MD 20889, United States. Electronic address: SEBrietzke@msn.com.
authors: Scott E
authors: SE
authors: Brietzke
mesh_terms: D000233:Adenoidectomy / Q000193:education*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination / Q000379:methods*; D020407:Internet; D008297:Male; D008876:Middle Ear Ventilation / Q000193:education*; D010290:Parents / Q000193:education*; D010361:Patients; D010372:Pediatrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D014068:Tonsillectomy / Q000193:education*; D014741:Video Recording
keywords: Adenoidectomy; Ear tubes; Parent education; Patient education; Tonsillectomy; YouTube