Surgeons on Social Media: Dissecting the Impact of Social Media Across Orthopaedic Subspecialties

Online reviews play a notable role in patient decision making when selecting healthcare providers, especially in orthopaedics where 38.4% of patients rely heavily on the internet for choosing their physician. Social media platforms offer orthopaedic surgeons tools to enhance their online presence, with the goal of potentially influencing higher ratings on physician review websites. We hypothesize that social media activity differs across orthopaedic subspecialties and is positively associated with physician review website ratings among orthopaedic surgeons.

Active members from the directories of Pediatric Orthopedic Society of North America, American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine, North American Spine Society, American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society, American Association for Hand Surgery, American Association of Hip and Knee Surgeons, and Orthopedic Trauma Association were randomly selected from each US state. Data included average ratings and total number of reviews from Google and Healthgrades, social media metrics from Facebook, X (Twitter), Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn, alongside demographics such as age, sex, years in practice, board certification, and PubMed-indexed publications. Analysis of variance assessed the relationship between social media posts, subspecialties, and practice settings, while multivariate regressions identified predictors of average ratings and total reviews.

A total of 1,039 surgeons were included. Social media engagement markedly differs across subspecialties; for example, the surgeons of American Association of Hip and Knee Surgeons have the most LinkedIn followers (120,962), while Pediatric Orthopedic Society of North America surgeons show no YouTube activity. Analysis of variance showed a significant difference in posting frequency among subspecialties ( P = 0.018), but no difference between private and academic settings ( P = 0.09). Regression analyses indicated that private practice (B = 0.27; P = 0.0036) and Facebook total posts (B = 0.001; P = 0.034) were associated with higher average Google ratings, while years in practice (B = 0.02; P < 0.001) and being in private practice (B = 0.28; P = 0.006) were associated with higher average Healthgrades ratings.

Social media activity among orthopaedic surgeons is associated with online ratings in a multifaceted manner, varying by platform and subspecialty. However, the strength of these associations was modest, with regression models demonstrating limited explanatory power for variations in online ratings across subspecialties. Strategic engagement-particularly on platforms aligned with a subspecialty's audience-may enhance a surgeon's digital presence and perceived reputation.