“Dr. Google, I am in Pain”—Global Internet Searches Associated with Pain: A Retrospective Analysis of Google Trends Data

Mikołaj Kamiński, Igor Łoniewski and Wojciech Marlicz
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Mikołaj Kamiński: Sanprobi Sp.z.o.o. Sp.K., 70-535 Szczecin, Poland
Igor Łoniewski: Department of Biochemistry and Human Nutrition, Pomeranian Medical University, 70-204 Szczecin, Poland
Wojciech Marlicz: Department of Gastroenterology, Pomeranian Medical University, 70-204 Szczecin, Poland

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 3, 1-14

Abstract: We aimed to rank the most common locations of pain among Google users globally and locally and analyze secular and seasonal trends in pain-related searches in the years 2004–2019. We used data generated by Google Trends (GT) to identify and analyze global interest in topics ( n = 24) related to locations of pain and how these progressed over time. We analyzed secular trends and time series decomposition to identify seasonal variations. We also calculated the interest in all topics with reference to the relative search volume (RSV) of “Abdominal pain”. Google users were most commonly interested in “Headache” (1.30 [times more frequently than “Abdominal pain”]), “Abdominal pain” (1.00), and “Back pain” (0.84). “Headache” was the most frequent search term in n = 41 countries, while “Abdominal pain” was the most frequent term in n = 27 countries. The interest in all pain-related topics except “Dyspareunia” increased over time. The sharpest increase was observed for “Abdominal pain” (5.67 RSV/year), and “Toothache” (5.52 RSV/year). Most of the topics revealed seasonal variations. Among pain-related topics, “Headache,” “Abdominal pain,” and “Back pain” interested most Google users. GT is a novel tool that allows retrospective investigation of complaints among Internet users.

Keywords: Google Trends; Internet; pain; headache; location; ranking; Abdominal pain; back pain; toothache; knee pain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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