Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Article
  • Published:

Erectile dysfunction and prostate diseases are the predominant Google search terms amongst men’s health topics

Abstract

Patients are becoming increasingly active consumers of health information on the internet with urologic concerns being no exception. Our objective was to explore online search trends for topics related to men’s health and identify information-seeking patterns related to news and media coverage of these topics. We used Google Trends (http://google.com/trends) to explore search trends for various search terms related to men’s health in the United States over a 5-year period. Search queries provided graphs depicting search volume as a function of time, geographical data, and related topics and queries. Isolated spikes in search volume were further explored to identify a related event. Erectile dysfunction was the most-searched topic over the last 5 years in the United States. Prostate cancer and benign prostatic hyperplasia were the second and third most-searched topics, respectively. Other popular topics involved symptoms or pathologies of the testicles and penis. Most topics had relatively stable search volumes, with the exceptions of premature ejaculation and Peyronie’s disease. Several observed spikes in search volume were attributable to singular events, mostly in the form of online article publications or social media posts. We believe it may be helpful for providers to stay informed of cultural events relating to medical conditions to anticipate patient concerns.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Most popular men’s health searches.
Fig. 2: Search trends for Peyronie’s disease.
Fig. 3: Associations in erectile dysfunction.
Fig. 4: Discrete spikes in search volumes for men’s health topics and relevant associations.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Hellawell GO, Turner KJ, Monnier KL, Brewster SF. Urology and the Internet: an evaluation of internet use by urology patients and of information available on urological topics. BJU Int. 2000;86:191–4.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Dreher PC, Tong CC, Ghiraldi EM, Friedlander JI. Use of Google Trends to track online behavior and interest in kidney stone surgery. Urology. 2018;121:74–8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Russo GI, di Mauro M, Cocci A, Cacciamani G, Cimino S, Serefoglu EC, et al. Consulting “Dr Google” for sexual dysfunction: a contemporary worldwide trend analysis. Int J Impot Res. 2020;32:455–61. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41443-019-0203-2

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Garijo BM, Katz JE, Greer A, Gonzalgo M, Lopez AG, Deane L, et al. Increase in searches for erectile dysfunction during winter: seasonal variation evidence from Google Trends in the United States. Int J Impot Res. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41443-020-00397-1

  5. Phillips CA, Leahy AB, Li Y, Schapira MM, Bailey LC, Merchant RM. Relationship between state-level Google online search volume and cancer incidence in the United States: retrospective study. J Med Internet Res. 2018;20:e6.

  6. Ortiz SN, Forrest LN, Fisher TJ, Hughes MC, Smith AR. Changes in internet suicide search volumes following celebrity suicides. Cyberpsychol Behav Soc Netw. 2019;22:373–80.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Hatzimouratidis K. Epidemiology of male sexual dysfunction. Am J Men’s Health. 2007;1:103–25.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Flynn KE, Lin L, Bruner DW, Cyranowski JM, Hahn EA, Jeffery DD, et al. Sexual satisfaction and the importance of sexual health to quality of life throughout the life course of U.S. adults. J Sex Med. 2016;13:1642–50.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Bray F, Ferlay J, Soerjomataram I, Siegel RL, Torre LA, Jemal A. Global cancer statistics 2018: GLOBOCAN estimates of incidence and mortality worldwide for 36 cancers in 185 countries. CA Cancer J Clin. 2018;68:394–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Egan KB. The epidemiology of benign prostatic hyperplasia associated with lower urinary tract symptoms: prevalence and incident rates. Urol Clin N Am. 2016;43:289–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Stiller B. The prostate cancer test that saved my life. [Web log post]. https://medium.com/cancer-moonshot/the-prostate-cancer-test-that-saved-my-life-613feb3f7c00. 2016.

  12. Vos SC, Sutton JN, Gibson CB, Butts, CT. Celebrity cancer on Twitter: mapping a novel opportunity for cancer prevention. Cancer Control. 2019;26:1073274819825826.

  13. Adrian N [@nathangadrian]. [Photograph of Nathan announcing his cancer diagnosis]. 2019. https://www.instagram.com/p/BtB85G9hg8S.

  14. Kristensen DM, Desdoits-Lethimonier C, Mackey AL, Dalgaard M, Masi FD, Munkbøl CH, et al. Ibuprofen alters human testicular physiology to produce a state of compensated hypogonadism. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2018;23;115:E715-E724.

  15. Diebel M, Hafner J. Ibuprofen use linked to male infertility, study finds. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2018/01/09/ibuprofen-use-linked-male-infertility-study-finds/1015949001/. 2018.

  16. First penile transplant in the nation. Mass General News. 2016. https://www.massgeneral.org/News/newsarticle.aspx?id=5856.

  17. Saitz TR, Serefoglu EC. The epidemiology of premature ejaculation. Transl Androl Urol. 2016;5:409-15.

  18. Endo Pharmaceuticals TV Commercial, ‘Peyronie’s Disease’. 2018.https://www.ispot.tv/ad/wxRQ/endo-pharmaceuticals-peyronies-disease#

  19. Xiaflex: collagenase clostridium histolyticum. https://peyronies-disease.xiaflex.com/patient/?utm_campaign=2018unbranded&utm_medium=TVandAudio&utm_source=learnaboutpd. 2018.

  20. Kobayashi LC, Wardle J, Wagner CV. Internet use, social engagement and health literacy decline during ageing in a longitudinal cohort of older English adults. J Epidemiol Community Health. 2015;69:278-83.

  21. Teh J, Wei J, Chiang G, Nzenza TC, Bolton DM, Lawrentschuk NL. Men’s health on the web: an analysis of current resources. World J Urol. 2019;37:1043–47.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Kaynak Y, Kaya C, Aykaç A. YouTube as a source of premature ejaculation. Rev Int Androl. 2019;18:63–7.

  23. Alsyouf M, Stokes PW, Hur DY, Amasyali AS, Ruckle HC, Hu B. ‘Fake News’ in urology: evaluating the accuracy of articles shared on social media in genitourinary malignancies. BJU Int. 2019. https://doi.org/10.1111/bju.14787.

  24. Thompson AE, Anisimowicz Y, Miedema BB, Hogg WE, Wodchis WP, Aubrey-Bassler K. The influence of gender and other patient characteristics on health care-seeking behaviour: a QUALICOPC study. BMC Fam Pract. 2016. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12875-016-0440-0.

  25. Loeb SL, Bayne CE, Frey C, Davies BJ, Averch TD, Woo H, et al. Use of social media in urology: data from the American Urological Association (AUA). BJU Int. 2014;113:993–8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Matta R, Doiron C, Leveridge MJ. The dramatic increase in social media in urology. J Urol. 2014;192:494–8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mark Arthur.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

KH and MA—no conflicts of interest. CW—Compensated Reviewer for Oakstone Publishing, Medscape.

Additional information

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Hanna, K., Arthur, M. & Welliver, C. Erectile dysfunction and prostate diseases are the predominant Google search terms amongst men’s health topics. Int J Impot Res 34, 552–557 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41443-021-00448-1

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41443-021-00448-1

This article is cited by

Search

Quick links