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Ischemic Stroke
Original research
#Fake news: a systematic review of mechanical thrombectomy results among neurointerventional stroke surgeons on Twitter
  1. Adam Andrew Dmytriw1,
  2. Thomas Joseph Sorenson2,3,
  3. Jonathan M Morris4,
  4. Patrick J Nicholson1,
  5. Christopher Alan Hilditch1,
  6. Christopher S Graffeo3,
  7. Waleed Brinjikji3,4
  1. 1 Department of Medical Imaging, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  2. 2 School of Medicine, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
  3. 3 Department of Neurologic Surgery, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA
  4. 4 Department of Radiology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Waleed Brinjikji, Departmentof Radiology, MayoClinic, Rochester MN 55902, USA; brinjikji.waleed{at}mayo.edu

Abstract

Objective Twitter is a popular social media platform among physicians. Neurointerventionalists frequently document their lifesaving mechanical thrombectomy cases on Twitter with very favorable results. We fear that there may be some social media publication bias to tweeted mechanical thrombectomy cases with neurointerventionalists being more likely to tweet cases with favorable outcomes. We used these publicly documented cases to analyze post-intervention Twitter-reported outcomes and compared these outcomes with the data provided in the gold standard literature.

Methods Two reviewers performed a search of Twitter for tweeted cases of acute ischemic strokes treated with mechanical thrombectomy. Data were abstracted from each tweet regarding baseline characteristics and outcomes. Twitter-reported outcomes were compared with the Highly Effective Reperfusion Evaluated in Multiple Endovascular Stroke (HERMES) trial individual patient meta-analysis.

Results When comparing the tweeted results to HERMES, tweeted cases had a higher post-intervention rate of modified Thrombolysis In Cerebral Infarction (mTICI) scale score of 2c/3 (94% vs 71%, respectively; p<0.0001) and rate of National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) score ≤2 (81% vs 21%, respectively; p<0.0001). There were no reported complications; thus, tweeted cases also had significantly lower rates of complications, including symptomatic intracerebral hemorrhage (0% vs 4.4%, respectively; p<0.0001), type 2 parenchymal hemorrhage (0% vs 5.1%, respectively; p<0.0001), and mortality (0% vs 15.3%, respectively; p<0.0001).

Conclusions There is a significant difference between social media and reality even within the ‘MedTwitter’ sphere, which is likely due to a strong publication bias in Twitter-reported cases. Content on ‘MedTwitter’, as with most social media, should be accepted cautiously.

  • stroke
  • thrombectomy
  • technology
  • technique

https://doi.org/10.1136/neurintsurg-2018-014319

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors AAD made substantial contributions to the conception and design of the work, data acquisition, and analysis. TJS and WB made substantial contributions to the conception and design of the work, data acquisition, analysis and interpretation, and drafting of the work. JMM, PJN, CAH, and CSG made substantial contributions to the conception and design of the work and revising it critically for important intellectual content. All authors gave final approval of the version to be published and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient consent Not required.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data sharing statement All data were gathered from publically available tweets and are available upon request from the corresponding author.