Assessment of the Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on population level interest in Skincare: Evidence from a google trends-based Infodemiology study

  1. Hasan Symum
  2. Md. F. Islam
  3. Habsa K. Hiya
  4. Kh M. Ali Sagor

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Abstract

Background

COVID-19 pandemic created an unprecedented disruption of daily life including the pattern of skin related treatments in healthcare settings by issuing stay-at-home orders and newly coronaphobia around the world.

Objective

This study aimed to evaluate whether there are any significant changes in population interest for skincare during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods

For the skincare, weekly RSV data were extracted for worldwide and 23 counties between August 1, 2016, and August 31, 2020. Interrupted time-series analysis was conducted as the quasi-experimental approach to evaluate the longitudinal effects of COVID-19 skincare related search queries. For each country, autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model relative search volume (RSV) time series and then testing multiple periods simultaneously to examine the magnitude of the interruption. Multivariate linear regression was used to estimate the correlation between countries’ relative changes in RSV with COVID-19 confirmed cases/ per 10000 patients and lockdown measures.

Results

Out of 23 included countries in our study, 17 showed significantly increased (p<0.01) RSVs during the lockdown period compared with the ARIMA forecasted data. The highest percentage of increments occurs in May and June 2020 in most countries. There was also a significant correlation between lockdown measures and the number of COVID-19 cases with relatives changes in population interests for skincare.

Conclusion

Understanding the trend and changes in skincare public interest during COVID-19 may assist health authorities to promote accessible educational information and preventive initiatives regarding skin problems.

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.11.16.20232868: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    NIH rigor criteria are not applicable to paper type.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    However, along with Telehealth, Teledermatogy has some limitations such as inadequate technical infrastructure, unequal reimbursement, and legal problems causing the delay of progress.38,39 In conclusion, this study provides an evaluation of public interests for skincare during this COVID-19 pandemic. The Google Trend analysis showed a significant increment in the public interest which could happen due to the lockdown restriction measures. The increment in public interests suggests the necessity of online contribution for skincare treatment. Since access to dermatologist care during lockdowns are scare and limited in most countries, the increasing public search interests in skin care also suggests the need for additional and urger medical care for untreated darmatological conditions. Finally, the analysis of Google Trends and the correlation between the COVID-19 pandemic and public interests for skincare can be help helpful for the dermatologists to analyze the present situation.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2020.11.16.20232868 on medRxiv