Establishing a taxonomy of potential hazards associated with communicating medical science in the age of disinformation.

ABSTRACT:

Objectives

Disinformation on medical matters has become an increasing public health concern. Public engagement by scientists, clinicians and patient advocates can contribute towards public understanding of medicine. However, depth of feeling on many issues (notably vaccination and cancer) can lead to adverse reactions for those communicating medical science, including vexatious interactions and targeted campaigns. Our objective in this work is to establish a taxonomy of common negative experiences encountered by those communicating medical science, and suggest guidelines so that they may be circumvented.

Design

We establish a taxonomy of the common negative experiences reported by those communicating medical science, informed by surveying medical science communicators with p

SUBMITTER: Grimes DR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7342820 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature