COVID-19 has induced seismic changes to the delivery of health care related information. As a contemporary entertainment and educational tool, podcasts have traditionally been enjoyed by a spectrum of consumers. While available before the onset of COVID-19, the awareness and utilization of medical centered podcasts began increasing exponentially in light of social and institutional restrictions on in-person communication and patient care.^1,2 In an era of easily accessible and on-demand information, podcasting is likely to be a useful tool to share concise, specialty specific, even disease specific information to both patients and providers alike. To gain a better, albeit small, understanding of the current landscape of health care podcasting for patients, we evaluated urology specific podcasts to describe existing trends in programing available to listeners.

Materials and Methods

We queried Apple^®, Google, Spotify, and Stitcher™ for English language podcasts with at least 1 published episode, using the search terms “urology” and “urologic surgery.” Programs were independently evaluated by 3 urological surgeons before being grouped into the predefined categories “Professional Society,’’ “Product/Marketing,” “Practice Management,” “Patient-Focused,” “Clinical Knowledge,” “Residency Preparation,” and “General” content; all categories defined and used in existing medical podcasting literature.¹

Programs published within 90 days from initial review (February 14, 2022) were defined as “active,” while all others were considered “inactive.” Program frequency was standardized by accounting for the total number of calendar days between the first and most recent program publication before being divided by the total number of episodes. Frequencies were defined as “daily,” “weekly,” “biweekly,” “monthly,” and “other” when content was published between 0–2, 3–10, 11–20, 21–40, and >40 days, respectively.

Summary of Results

A total of 70 unique urology-focused podcasts were identified. “Patient Focused,” “General,” and “Practice Management” comprised the most prevalent programs at 29 (41%), 15 (21%), and 10 (14%), respectively. Programs were most often directed by a single host (63 [90%]). Forty-six (66%) hosts were male, 10 (14%) female, and 14 (20%) co-ed hosts. Thirty-eight podcasts (54%) were hosted by practicing urologists, while 25 (36%), 4 (6%), and 3 (4%) were hosted by nonmedical individuals, residents in training, or other medical professionals, respectively.

In terms of podcasts with “active” content, only 34 were identified, 24 (71%) of which were started during or after 2020 (see Figure). One program has remained active since 2006! Since 2019, urological-focused podcasting has grown nearly 6-fold, ∼580%, or at the rate of nearly 1 new podcast every 1.24 months (see Figure).

“Patient-Focused” programing comprised the majority with 15 (44%) newly founded programs. Active programs averaged 70.55 episodes with content published weekly (13 [38%]), biweekly (9 [26%]), and monthly (8 [24%]). Twenty-one (62%) were hosted by male moderators and 23 (68%) originated from within the U.S.

Figure. Trend of the increase in active podcasts from 2006–2022.

Discussion

While likely multifactorial, the growth of podcasting within urology is likely accentuated by the COVID-19 pandemic as patients seek alternative, often mobile, and online sources for information. Urology is not alone in this new realm of explosive podcast growth. Our findings align with similarly published trends within orthopedic and plastic surgery. Jella et al identified the number of orthopedic podcasts having increased from 28 to 65 between 2019 and 2020,¹ while Eliora et al observed nearly 100% plastic surgery podcast growth during this identical time.² It appears clear that the demand for resources that facilitate health care exposure while accommodating social restrictions have allowed podcasts to flourish; “Patient Focused” programming blossomed by 275% alone in our review between 2019 to 2022.

Proliferation of patient related programing is ultimately likely to help bridge a gap and need in patient care accentuated by COVID-19 restrictions. While existent and slowly being adopted, remote technology has become an essential and paradigm shifting way to interact with patients, significantly influencing and changing patient expectations and care. A recent study showed that Medicare Part B visits conducted via telehealth increased from 840,000 to 52 million between 2019 to 2020, solidifying the importance of electronic communication today and into the future.³ The high prevalence of new urological podcasts since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic suggests that developers not only acknowledge patients’ increasing ability to adapt to technology but also for increased avenues to access health information that may not involve the standard face-to-face discussion or office-based interaction.

While convenient, online information can have pitfalls related to misinformation, which can present a serious barrier to accurate health information dissemination. This has been found in staggering levels online, primarily YouTube, as noted most recently by Yang et al⁴ and Merianos et al⁵ in independent studies. Both investigators described the prevalence of health-related misinformation to be approximately 98% and 65%, respectively.^4,5 While not immune to misinformation, podcasting is likely to demonstrate similar findings and should not be taken lightly by listeners (patients or clinicians alike!). Appreciating the degree of podcast growth towards patients cannot and should not be ignored, and rather should be acknowledged when counseling or treatment discussions do take place.

It is important to note that several podcast series that were identified during the early onset of the COVID-19 pandemic offering weekly content, however, appear to have tapered production and were subsequently dormant or “inactive” at the time of our review. While knowing these trends in health-related information consumption can be insightful, it will become increasingly paramount to determine the quality of published content reaching patients. Unfortunately, there is no objective way to reliably evaluate program quality.

Conclusions

It is increasingly clear that information pursuit and consumption is changing in the post-COVID-19 health care landscape. Podcast utilization and prevalence is likely to continue growing to meet the tremendous interest of patients in domains across all specialties, not just within urology. Additional content evaluation within these podcasts is warranted to better understand the quality and accuracy of the information provided, and to further assess the potential utilization of the material by providers in practice and training.