Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs.
Pollen forecasts are in use everywhere to inform therapeutic decisions for patients with allergic rhinoconjunctivitis (ARC). We exploited data derived from Twitter in order to identify tweets reporting a combination of symptoms consistent with a case definition of ARC and those reporting the name of...
Main Authors: | , , , , , , , |
---|---|
Format: | Article |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2015-01-01
|
Series: | PLoS ONE |
Online Access: | http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4510127?pdf=render |
id |
doaj-db11bbfb2e9e40d2ba3cfd561f182ded |
---|---|
record_format |
Article |
spelling |
doaj-db11bbfb2e9e40d2ba3cfd561f182ded2020-11-24T21:24:26ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032015-01-01107e013370610.1371/journal.pone.0133706Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs.Francesco GesualdoGiovanni StiloAngelo D'AmbrosioEmanuela CarloniElisabetta PandolfiPaola VelardiAlessandro FiocchiAlberto E TozziPollen forecasts are in use everywhere to inform therapeutic decisions for patients with allergic rhinoconjunctivitis (ARC). We exploited data derived from Twitter in order to identify tweets reporting a combination of symptoms consistent with a case definition of ARC and those reporting the name of an antihistamine drug. In order to increase the sensitivity of the system, we applied an algorithm aimed at automatically identifying jargon expressions related to medical terms. We compared weekly Twitter trends with National Allergy Bureau weekly pollen counts derived from US stations, and found a high correlation of the sum of the total pollen counts from each stations with tweets reporting ARC symptoms (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.95) and with tweets reporting antihistamine drug names (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.93). Longitude and latitude of the pollen stations affected the strength of the correlation. Twitter and other social networks may play a role in allergic disease surveillance and in signaling drug consumptions trends.http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4510127?pdf=render |
collection |
DOAJ |
language |
English |
format |
Article |
sources |
DOAJ |
author |
Francesco Gesualdo Giovanni Stilo Angelo D'Ambrosio Emanuela Carloni Elisabetta Pandolfi Paola Velardi Alessandro Fiocchi Alberto E Tozzi |
spellingShingle |
Francesco Gesualdo Giovanni Stilo Angelo D'Ambrosio Emanuela Carloni Elisabetta Pandolfi Paola Velardi Alessandro Fiocchi Alberto E Tozzi Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. PLoS ONE |
author_facet |
Francesco Gesualdo Giovanni Stilo Angelo D'Ambrosio Emanuela Carloni Elisabetta Pandolfi Paola Velardi Alessandro Fiocchi Alberto E Tozzi |
author_sort |
Francesco Gesualdo |
title |
Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. |
title_short |
Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. |
title_full |
Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. |
title_fullStr |
Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Can Twitter Be a Source of Information on Allergy? Correlation of Pollen Counts with Tweets Reporting Symptoms of Allergic Rhinoconjunctivitis and Names of Antihistamine Drugs. |
title_sort |
can twitter be a source of information on allergy? correlation of pollen counts with tweets reporting symptoms of allergic rhinoconjunctivitis and names of antihistamine drugs. |
publisher |
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
series |
PLoS ONE |
issn |
1932-6203 |
publishDate |
2015-01-01 |
description |
Pollen forecasts are in use everywhere to inform therapeutic decisions for patients with allergic rhinoconjunctivitis (ARC). We exploited data derived from Twitter in order to identify tweets reporting a combination of symptoms consistent with a case definition of ARC and those reporting the name of an antihistamine drug. In order to increase the sensitivity of the system, we applied an algorithm aimed at automatically identifying jargon expressions related to medical terms. We compared weekly Twitter trends with National Allergy Bureau weekly pollen counts derived from US stations, and found a high correlation of the sum of the total pollen counts from each stations with tweets reporting ARC symptoms (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.95) and with tweets reporting antihistamine drug names (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.93). Longitude and latitude of the pollen stations affected the strength of the correlation. Twitter and other social networks may play a role in allergic disease surveillance and in signaling drug consumptions trends. |
url |
http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4510127?pdf=render |
work_keys_str_mv |
AT francescogesualdo cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT giovannistilo cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT angelodambrosio cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT emanuelacarloni cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT elisabettapandolfi cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT paolavelardi cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT alessandrofiocchi cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs AT albertoetozzi cantwitterbeasourceofinformationonallergycorrelationofpollencountswithtweetsreportingsymptomsofallergicrhinoconjunctivitisandnamesofantihistaminedrugs |
_version_ |
1725988220268707840 |