Transcript poster - Jiang Bian

Surveillance of HPV vaccination discourse on Twitter in the United States
A case study of Kansas and Rhode Island
Christopher
1 National
1
Wheldon,
Jiang
2
Bian,
Richard
1
Moser
Cancer Institute • National Institutes of Health • U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
2 Health Outcomes & Policy • College of Medicine • University of Florida
Results
Introduction
High tweet volume
Characteristics of tweets
in high volume states
(volume normalized by State population)
Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination is a safe and
effective strategy in the primary prevention of HPV-related
cancers (e.g., cervical, vulvar, vaginal, penile, anal, and
oropharyngeal cancers).
47%
retweets
Maryland
Kansas
76%
Shared
URL
Hawaii
-NEGATIVE SENTIMENT-
Relevant Tweets
N = 436,617
English Tweets with
state geographic
information
(N = 21,158)
Measures/Analysis:
Popularity. Volume of tweets normalized by each state’s
population according to the 2010 statistics published by the U.S.
Census Bureau.
1. Rhode
Island
268
1.3%
66
4
2. Hawaii
249
1.2%
63
4
3. Vermont
86
0.4%
36
2
4. Maryland
809
3.8%
341
2
5. Kansas
355
1.7%
127
3
RI:31%
Rhode Island
KS:27%
Kansas
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
• 28% of tweets from
Kansas University
Cancer Center in
support of HPV
vaccination and
promoting a Twitter
chat
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
Rhode Island
• 32% of tweets from
group lobbying to
overturn state
HPV-vaccine
mandate
Thematic codes
• Negative sentiment directed toward low-vaccine
uptake and not the vaccine itself
Rhode Island
(N = 269)
Avg. # posts
per users
KS:31%
Kansas
Kansas
(N = 356)
#
Distinct
Users
RI:22%
2.5
Sample: Tweets in English with identifiable geolocation within the
United States posted between 2/18/2016-6/16/2016.
% of
total
U.S.
States
+POSITIVE SENTIMENT+
Research objectives: Characterize discourse regarding
HPV vaccination with regard to (1) popularity of the topic,
(2) sentiment of discourse, (3) content, and (4) information
sources.
Data source: twython library for accessing the Twitter APIs.
Example keywords: hpv; Human Papillomavirus Vaccine.
#
Tweets
Rhode Island
• Low coverage and state variations maybe related to
public perceptions and attitudes towards HPV
vaccination
Methods
State
tweets
• Coverage for HPV vaccination remain low and varies
considerably by state
Scientific problem: There are no automated national
surveillance systems with the capacity to monitor
population attitudes toward HPV vaccination in a timely
manner, leaving public health professionals and policy
makers with limited information to respond to public
concerns, misinformation, and low vaccine uptake.
Vermont
>21K
• Expressed “alarm” over the state’s low number of HPV
vaccinations
• Anti-vaccination content was minimal
• Tweets in support of legislation to remove the 2014
mandate that children in RI receive HPV vaccination
before entering the 7th grade
• Grassroots political action
• Conflict between mandate and awareness of the link
between HPV infection and cancer
Sentiment. Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) tool.
Coverage. 2014 National Immunization Survey-Teen (NIS-Teen).
Received > 1 doses of HPV vaccination, adolescents 13-17.
Females
Males
National Average
60.0(±1.9) 41.7(±1.8)
Rhode Island (Highest)
76.0(±7.7) 69.0(±7.5)
Kansas
(Lowest for Females)
38.3(±9.5) 32.8(±8.6)
Tweet Content. Qualitative content analysis (MAXQDA) was used
to code tweets to identify themes pertaining to specific topics and
information sources.
Kansas rates for #HPV vaccination are the
lowest in the nation. "The vaccine
prevents cancer. What's the problem?"
At #RhodeIsland State House working to
remove the HPV vaccine mandate. We
appreciate all of you! #VaccineChoiceRI
Conclusions & Future Work
• The target of classification (sentiment toward HPV
vaccination) was missed using general HPV-related
keywords
• Qualitative analysis of Twitter data provided context
for public health intervention
• Test alternative sentiment classification methods to
identify people’s attitudes toward HPV vaccination
• Explore correlations between sentiment, volume,
and HPV vaccine coverage.