InfectoCast: A Digital Ecosystem for Infectious Diseases Education and Science Communication in Brazil

Digital platforms have expanded access to continuing medical education (CME), with podcasts and social media increasingly used as asynchronous learning resources. However, most established digital medical education initiatives operate primarily in English, creating linguistic and contextual barriers for professionals in non-Anglophone settings. Infectious diseases (ID) require frequent updating, and access to structured ID-focused CME in middle-income countries such as Brazil remains uneven. InfectoCast is a Brazilian digital initiative that integrates podcasting, social media, and written resources to support infectious diseases education and science communication in Portuguese.

We conducted a descriptive, retrospective quantitative analysis of platform-level analytics from the InfectoCast digital ecosystem between 18 September 2020 and 18 October 2025. Podcast metrics, including total plays, listening time, and geographic distribution, were extracted from Spotify for Podcasters. Social media metrics were obtained from native analytics dashboards, primarily from Instagram, with supplementary data from other platforms. Analyses focused on audience reach, growth trends, and the structure of the multi-platform dissemination strategy.

During the study period, the InfectoCast podcast released 168 episodes, accumulating 481 000 total plays and 53 962 hours of listening across 97 countries, with 96.9% of plays originating in Brazil. The Instagram account reached 110 000 followers and functioned as the primary platform for visual educational content, including infographics, educational carousels, short-form videos, and interactive Stories. When combined with YouTube, X (formerly Twitter), LinkedIn, the blog, and the newsletter, the ecosystem achieved an estimated monthly reach of approximately 3 million users. The integration of audio, visual, and written formats enabled coordinated dissemination of infectious diseases educational content across platforms.

This descriptive case report documents the structure, reach, and growth of InfectoCast, a Portuguese-language digital ecosystem dedicated to infectious diseases education and science communication. The findings illustrate the feasibility of integrating podcasting with social media and other digital formats to deliver educational content in a non-Anglophone context. This ecosystem-based approach may inform the development of similar initiatives in other medical specialties and regions where access to locally contextualized digital education is limited.