Small talk, Big data: Patients’ and general public’s perceptions about patients

Objectives. There are, on average, three people who die daily from an asthma attack in the UK. Asthma self-management and good adherence can reduce this rate of mortality. Since adherence to preventative medication is important for many people with asthma, we investigated asthma patients' and non-patients’ perceptions about asthma, the similarities between themes in interviews and on Twitter and potential influence on adherence. Design. Both patients' and non-patients' perceptions about asthma were examined in a combination of interviews and content analysis of Twitter data.Methods. Fourteen semi-structured interviews were conducted and analysed using thematic analysis; A coding instrument was developed to capture perceptions on Twitter and a content analysis was conducted on 3.000 tweets. Convergence analysis identified similar topics between interviews and social media data analysis and where these were similar or different. Results. Several themes emerged from interviews, grouped as patients’ internal perceptions (about asthma) and external perceptions (what they considered were others’ perceptions). Qualitative analysis of Twitter content resulted in identification of several themes with negative humour and self-pity being the most prominent ones. Convergence analysis revealed mutual topics from tweets and interviews: self-pity, humour, disclosure, lack of understanding - topics that reflect stigmatization; attachment to inhaler and perceived sense of community.