Quantifying Patient Demand for Orthopedics Care by Region Through Google Trends Analysis: Descriptive Epidemiology Study.

Abstract

Background: There is a growing gap between the supply of surgeons and the demand for orthopedic services in the United States.

Objective: We analyzed publicly available online data to assess the correlation between the supply of orthopedic surgeons and patient demand across the United States. The geographic trends of this gap were assessed by using the relative demand index (RDI) to guide precision public health interventions such as resource allocation, residency program expansion, and workforce planning to specific regions.

Methods: The data used were from the US Census Bureau, Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) through their 2024 Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) directory, AAMC State Physician Workforce Data Report, and Google Trends. We calculated the normalized relative search volume (RSV) and the RDI and compared them to the densities of orthopedic surgeons across the United States. We examined the disparities with the Spearman rank correlation coefficient.

Results: The supply of orthopedic surgeons varied greatly across the United States, with a significantly higher demand for them in southern states (P=.02). The orthopedic surgeon concentration, normalized to the highest density, was the highest in Alaska (n=100), the District of Columbia (n=96), and Wyoming (n=72); and the lowest in Texas (n=0), Arkansas (n=6), and Oklahoma (n=64). The highest RDI values were observed in Utah (n=97), Florida (n=88), and Texas (n=83), while the lowest were observed in Alaska (n=0), the District of Columbia (n=5), and New Hampshire (n=7). The 7 states of Alaska, Maine, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Delaware, and Idaho lacked orthopedic surgery residencies. In 2023, New York (n=19), Michigan (n=17), Ohio (n=17), Pennsylvania (n=16), and California (n=16) had the most residency programs. Demand and supply, represented by the RDI and orthopedic surgeon concentration, respectively, were strongly correlated negatively (ρ=-0.791, P<.001). States that were in the top quartile of residency programs (≥4 residency programs) exhibited a high demand for orthopedic surgeons (ρ=.6035, P=.02).

Conclusions: This study showed that regional disparities in access to orthopedic care can be addressed by increasing orthopedic residencies. The study highlights the novel application of the RDI to mapping the regional need for orthopedics, and this map allows for better targeted resource allocation to expand orthopedic surgery training.