Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Pediatrics and Parenting
Date Submitted: Sep 13, 2023
Date Accepted: May 3, 2024
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Disclosure Patterns of Opioid Use Disorders in Perinatal Care During the Opioid Epidemic on Twitter from 2019 to 2021: Thematic Analysis
ABSTRACT
Background:
In 2021, the United States (US) experienced a 14% rise in drug overdose deaths totaling 106, 699, largely driven by opioid intake, especially among individuals in the perinatal period who face increased risks from opioid use disorders (OUD), contributing to rising concerns about the impacts of escalating opioid misuse among pregnant and postpartum persons. Most of current limited perinatal OUD studies were conducted using traditional methods, such as interviews and randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to understand opioid misuse treatment, risk factors, and associated adverse effects. However, it remains relatively unknown in terms of using social media data, such as Twitter, recently renamed as X, to explore and identify broad perinatal OUD trends, disclosure and communication patterns, and public health surveillance on OUD in the perinatal period.
Objective:
The aim of this study is to enhance the overall understanding of opioid use patterns during the perinatal period and assess public trends by analyzing relevant public health posts on Twitter.
Methods:
We extracted 6 million raw perinatal-themed tweets posted by global Twitter users during the Opioid Epidemic from May 2019 to October 2021. After data cleaning and sampling, we used 500 tweets related to OUD in the perinatal period by US Twitter users for a thematic analysis using NVIVO software.
Results:
Seven major themes emerged from our thematic analysis based on the sample of 500 tweets: (1) political views related to harmful opioid and other substance use, (2) perceptions of others' substance use, (3) lived experiences of opioid and other substance use, (4) news report articles concerning opioid and other substance use, (5) healthcare initiatives, (6) adverse effects on children's health due to parental substance use, and (7) topics related to non-opioid substance use.
Conclusions:
Social media platforms such as Twitter can serve as a valuable tool for analyzing real-time discourse and exploring public perceptions, opinions, and behaviors related to maternal substance use, particularly, harmful opioid use in the perinatal period. More can be carried out on social media for health promotions and government initiatives to support the vulnerable OUD perinatal population.
Citation
