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Nebraska researchers are looking into how online content creators are promoting opioid awareness. They plan to use their findings to create a national health communication campaign.
The group’s most recent study examined 100 TikTok videos with the hashtag “#narcansaveslives” or “#naloxonesaveslives” to see who was posting, what information they included and how they explained it. Naloxone, commonly known as Narcan, is a Food and Drug Administration approved medication that rapidly reverses the effects of an opioid overdose.
Kelli Boling, assistant professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications, led the study.
“If we eventually want to roll out a larger campaign, we want to see who is doing their own individual work in that right now, and how we can learn from them before we move into that stage,” she said.
For the researchers’ first study, which was published May of this year, they interviewed content creators to learn why they were sharing opioid awareness information and how they were reaching wider audiences. The most recent study analyzed the creators’ videos to see which methods were most effective.
Boling said there were several reasons for focusing on TikTok in the study. Videos include more elements to be analyzed, so the researchers could look at what the creators looked like, largely to see if they appeared to be health professionals or not, what sort of setting they made the videos in and what kinds of hashtags they used.
Boling said a main reason they focused on TikTok is because one in five Americans said they check TikTok for health information before consulting a doctor, according to a 2022 CharityRx survey of 2,000 adults.
Boling said the researchers found a number of videos that included some level of misinformation about Naloxone, but the group’s focus is on how creators are sharing the messaging itself as they plan for their own campaign.
“The overall goal would be to educate people on the fact that you can carry Narcan, naloxone, and you can save lives,” she said.
Naloxone is available for free in Nebraska at participating pharmacies.
The group is currently applying for a series of grants to fund the next phase of its work. It plans to eventually start a social media campaign in Nebraska with the goal of going national.