Abstract
PURPOSE: This study aims to determine the content and intent of posts published under popular ophthalmology hashtags and to determine whether these posts were educational for ophthalmologists. METHODS: A web-based, cross-sectional study design was used to evaluate the top public posts of five popular hashtags on three consecutive days by two ophthalmology specialists. The first 100 relevant English posts of each hashtag were studied. Selected hashtags were #Ophthalmology, #ophthalmosurgery, #ophthalmologyresident, #ophthalmologist, and #ophthalmicphotography. Posts were classified according to the type of post, post author, post intent, and whether the post was educational. Posts deemed educational were then categorized separately using the same classification system as above to determine whether there were defining characteristics of educational posts. RESULTS: One thousand posts were recorded and analyzed and a total of 500 posts were included in the study. The majority of posts 79.8% (n = 399), were by medical doctors with 95% (n = 379) being ophthalmology specialists. Sixty-three percent of posts (n = 315) were deemed educational, 25% promotional (n = 127), and 12% (n = 58) were entertainment posts. Medical retina (n = 119) and anterior segment (n = 90) were the most common subspecialties explored. #ophthalmicphotography (P = 0.001) was the hashtag with the highest number of educational posts (n = 91). The least educational hashtag was #ophthalmologist with only 44% of posts (n = 44) that were deemed to be educational. One hundred percent of glaucoma posts (n = 19), 98% of cornea posts (n = 41), and 99% of medical retina posts (n = 118) were found to be educational which was significantly more educational than the other topics posted (P ≤ 0.001). CONCLUSION: Ophthalmologists are the main authors of posts in popular ophthalmology hashtags. The majority of posts were educational posts with promotional posts being the second most common intent. The authors conclude that while Instagram is a possible source of ancillary education for the visual specialty of ophthalmology, careful selection of hashtags and post authors are needed for maximum benefit.