Drug Use in the Twittersphere: A Qualitative Contextual Analysis of Tweets About Prescription Drugs

Abstract

Tweets about prescription opioid use may reveal insights into the prescription drug epidemic. We qualitatively assessed 2,100 tweets about prescription opioids utilizing a Twitter Archiving Google Spreadsheet® and determined whether the tweet represented: abuse (i.e., use to get high), not abuse (i.e., use as analgesic), or was not characterizable (e.g., “I need a Percocet”) and whether the connotation was positive (i.e. promote psychoactive or analgesic use), negative (i.e., adverse event), or not characterizable. Abuse was commonly described and the majority of terms (>66%) represented a positive connotation. Twitter can be a resource to observe trends in perceptions about prescription opioid use.

KEYWORDS:

• Twitter
• prescription drug abuse
• toxicovigilance