Sixty-five percent of adults look for medical advice on sites such as Google, YouTube or TikTok before consulting their provider, according to a survey commissioned by pharmacy service CharityRx.
The "Shifting Role of Influence and Authority in the Rx Drug and Health Supplement Market" survey was conducted by Pollfish, a market research company, in the past 12 months. It asked 2,000 adults in the U.S. about where they first look for medical information.
Here are four more findings of the survey:
- Sixty-eight percent of adults ages 26 to 41 and 64 percent of adults ages 42 to 76 go to Google for medical advice before a physician.
- Thirty-three percent of adults said they look to YouTube before consulting a medical professional.
- Thirty-seven percent of adults said they turn to influencers for medical advice first because they are more accessible than providers. Despite this, 89 percent of all adults said it is likely that social media influencers contribute to health misinformation.
- Fifty-one percent of respondents said they have purchased a product to treat a health concern after seeing it on social media.