Using the Baidu index to understand Chinese interest in thyroid related diseases

Common thyroid diseases are hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism, thyroiditis, thyroid tumor and so on. Baidu is currently the most widely used online search tool in China, has developed an internet search trends collection and analysis tool called the Baidu Index. The aim of the present study was to understand the trend and characteristics of public’s online attention to thyroid diseases, and to explore the value of Baidu Index in monitoring online retrieval behavior of thyroid-related information. Taking the period from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2019 as the time range into consideration, we used the big data analysis tool of Baidu Index and took “thyroid nodules”, “thyroid cancer”, “thyroiditis” “hyperthyroidism” and “hypothyroidism” as the keywords, the data of “search index” and “media index” were recorded on a weekly basis, and all information were aggregated into quarterly and annual to generate the final data which was carried out for secondary analysis. Pearson correlation analysis was used to analyze the correlation between the search index of keywords and the year. One-way Analysis of Variance was used to analyze the differences between search index and media index. Among the five keywords, thyroid nodule search index had the highest growth rate (640%), followed by thyroid cancer (298%). The media’s attention to thyroid diseases had been declining year by year. Unlike the public’s attention, the media index of hyperthyroidism was significantly higher than other keywords. Over the past nine years, the public's attention to thyroid-related diseases has been increasing gradually. Baidu Index is an effective tool to track the health information query behavior of Chinese internet users, which can provide a cost-effective supplement to traditional monitoring system.