ABSTRACT #39

Assessing The Impact Of A Virtual Platform To Provide Global Equitable Oncology Education To Healthcare Professionals

Yan Leyfman, Shubhadarshini Pawar, Alexandra Van de Kieft, Gayathri Menon, Muskan Joshi, William Wilkerson, Maduri Balasubramanian, Sean Jackewicz, Audun Utengen,, Steve Wilson, Chandler Park

PURPOSE AND GOALS: In 2022, a Pew Research Study showed that social media use has increased to 72% amongst U.S. adults and has become an integral tool for the dissemination of healthcare information. However, it is also outlet for the proliferation of misinformation, presenting a widespread challenge and creating a burden to both individual and public health globally, especially in resource-limited regions which are plagued by extensive healthcare outcome disparities. To address this, MedNews Week, a free, virtual educational platform streamed on several mainstream social media platforms, was developed to provide global health education through weekly oncology programming. The leading show, Keynote Conference, features live virtual presentations from oncology’s premier global leaders discussing the latest developments in the field before a mainstream worldwide audience. The aim of this study was to assess the global reach and impact of this cost-free, virtual medical education platform.

METHODS: From January-September 2022, MedNews Week hosted 30 global leaders in oncology (h-index = 60). Viewership, impressions, and social media outreach data were collected from the accounts of MedNews Week and its respective members. In collaboration with Symplur, data was analyzed to measure the program’s global reach, and a mixed-methods approach was employed to assess engagement. To reach healthcare professionals, MedNews Week partnered with VuMedi, a global video education platform for doctors, which provided data including viewership, global reach, page views, and unique visits.

EVALUATION PLAN: Data from Symplur and VuMedi was aggregated, descriptive analysis was performed, and a mixed- methods approach was employed to assess engagement.

SUMMARY OF RESULTS: During this nine-month period, MedNews Week programming extended across 54 countries with over 11.9K tweets, 5.7K retweets, and 41 million Twitter impressions. A network analysis of MedNews Week’s main accounts demonstrated that cross-community engagement was enhanced by the usage of hashtags, which successfully expanded global audience viewership. A steady increase in the number of Keynote Conference attendees was observed, with viewership per month increasing from 2,989 (January 2022) to 24,110 (September 2022).

REFLECTIVE CRITIQUE: MedNews Week’s continued growth in viewership and global reach amongst both healthcare professionals and the mainstream as a virtual and cost-free platform demonstrates its emergence as a viable outlet to combat medical misinformation, especially in lower socioeconomic regions. While previous studies have identified internet access and cost as barriers to high-quality medical information, MedNews Week has experienced steady growth and reachability especially within these limited areas. The platform’s ability to showcase global leaders to mainstream and healthcare professional audiences at no cost offers a practical approach to combat educational inequity. Thus, such a platform has demonstrated great potential to positively impact oncology education globally.