Utilizing Google Trends to Assess Worldwide Interest in Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Commonly Associated Treatments

Abstract

Background: Examining the prevalence of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) across regions has been challenging given significant methodological heterogeneity.

Aims: We aimed to perform a uniform assessment of the global burden of IBS using data from Google Trends, a novel, online tool.

Methods: Google Trends measures popularity of a search term in a given week compared to popularity of all search terms in that week, calculated as relative search volume (RSV). We compiled data on the popularity of IBS and its treatments across 173 countries between 2014 and 2018. We compared Google Trends popularity for IBS with prior epidemiological prevalence data, while controlling for gross domestic product (GDP) per capita and physician density.

Results: Of the 173 countries with Google Trends data, 137 countries also had data for GDP per capita and physician density. Worldwide popularity of IBS as a search topic increased from 79 to 89 (13% increase by RSV) over the 5-year period between 2014 and 2018. Country-specific change in IBS RSV ranged from - 35% (Nigeria) to + 64% (Pakistan). There was poor correlation between the Google Trends data and prior epidemiological data (0.08, Pearson correlation, p = 0.64). Popularity of the low-FODMAP diet increased the most among 8 common therapies (RSV 41 to 89, 117% increase).

Conclusions: Google Trends is a novel tool that can complement traditional epidemiological methods in gastrointestinal disease. Future research is needed to assess its utility and accuracy as a measure of disease burden across different gastrointestinal diseases.

Keywords: Epidemiology; Laxatives; Low-FODMAP diet; Prevalence; Probiotics.