Who is talking about #Facelift on Instagram?

Area of Science:

• Medical information dissemination
• Social media analytics
• Plastic surgery

Background:

• Social media platforms are increasingly used by medical professionals for patient engagement and practice promotion.
• Understanding the landscape of online medical information is crucial for effective patient communication.
• This study focuses on identifying content creators discussing facelift procedures on Instagram.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze who is posting content related to facelift procedures on Instagram.
• To categorize the primary specialty, country of practice, and board certification of content creators.
• To assess the representation of plastic surgeons in facelift-related social media content.

Main Methods:

• Utilized Sprinklr, a social listening platform, to collect Instagram posts from January 1, 2021, to February 28, 2021.
• Searched for posts using hashtags such as #facelift, #necklift, and #plasticsurgery.
• Analyzed top 100 English and Spanish posts based on likes, categorizing posters by specialty, country, and certifications.

Main Results:

• A total of 5099 posts were analyzed. For top English posts, the USA dominated (59%), with 48% of posters being physicians, and 42% of those being US board-certified plastic surgeons.
• For top Spanish posts, Mexico (29%) and Colombia (25%) were most represented. Physicians comprised 78% of posters, with 38.5% being certified plastic surgeons.
• A notable portion of facelift content originated from non-physicians and non-plastic surgeons.

Conclusions:

• Plastic surgeons are increasing their presence on Instagram for facelift-related content.
• However, a significant amount of popular content concerning the surgical facelift procedure was posted by non-physicians in 2021.
• This suggests a need for greater emphasis on content creation by qualified plastic surgeons to ensure accurate patient information.