#MultipleSclerosis: Artificial intelligence-based sentiment and content analysis of Tweets

ObjectivesThe aim is to uncover the perspectives of Twitter users on Multiple Sclerosis (MS) in English tweets by: (i) determining the sentiment of the text (ii) identifying the discussed topics.MethodsThe tweets were scanned in April 2023 using the keywords "multiple sclerosis, multiplesclerosis". Artificial intelligence-based sentiment analysis was conducted on a total of 1168 tweets and content analysis was performed on 17.4% of these tweets.ResultsTweets of 44% are positive and 22.3% are negative sentiment. As a result of content analysis, three themes and their sub-themes were identified: (i) announcement sharing: invitation to support, promotion of academic publications, (ii) information sharing: information providers, information seekers, news providers, (iii) experience sharing: challenging MS, facilitated MS, emotionally impactful MS, comparative MS, misunderstood MS. Subjective content such as experiences is shared less frequently compared to objective content such as announcements and information.DiscussionThe findings of this study can serve as a guiding factor in supporting positive views, managing negative views, and promoting the expression of subjective experiences.