Anomalous asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Google Trends patterns during the COVID-19 pandemic.

ABSTRACT:

Background

An increase in online searches on health topics may either mirror epidemiological changes or reflect media coverage. In the context of COVID-19, this is particularly relevant, as COVID-19 symptoms may be mistaken for those of respiratory disease exacerbations. Therefore, we aimed to assess Internet search patterns on asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in the context of COVID-19, as compared to searches on other chronic diseases.

Methods

We retrieved Google Trends (GTs) data on two respiratory (asthma and COPD) and three non-respiratory (diabetes, hypertension, and Crohn's disease) chronic diseases over the past 5 years (up to May 31, 2020). For 54 countries, and for each disease, we built autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) models

SUBMITTER: Sousa-Pinto B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7604916 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature