The Role of YouTube as an Information Platform for Ovarian Cancer: the Educational Quality and Reliability

Purpose: Ovarian cancer is the eighth most common malignancy among women worldwide and remains associated with poor survival.Patients and caregivers often experience unmet informational needs and turn to online resources such as YouTube; however, the quality and reliability of ovarian cancer-related content have not been evaluated.Materials and Methods: On October 4, 2022, the 100 most-viewed YouTube videos retrieved using the keyword "ovarian cancer" were screened, and 86 English-language videos were included.Data collected included uploader type, views, length, likes, dislikes, comments, and content category.Educational quality and informational reliability were assessed using the Global Quality Score (GQS) and modified DISCERN criteria.Three obstetrics and gynecology residents independently rated all videos.Group comparisons were performed using the Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests, and inter-rater reliability was assessed by intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC).Results: Of the 86 videos, 56.98% were uploaded by medical sources and 43.02% by non-medical sources.Informational content comprised 49%, followed by patient experience (43%).The videos collectively accumulated over 16 million views.Non-medical videos were longer and received more likes and comments, with a higher like ratio.The mean GQS was 3.51.1 (moderate quality), and the mean modified DISCERN was 2.21.1 (low reliability).Modified DISCERN scores were higher in medical than nonmedical videos (p=0.001).Inter-rater agreement was excellent (ICC>0.9).Conclusion: YouTube provides broad access to ovarian cancer-related information, but a substantial gap exists between educational quality and informational reliability.Professional involvement and platform-level strategies may improve evidence attribution and the educational value of popular videos.