Leveraging Google Trends to identify Indonesian tuberculosis trends before and after the implementation of a national mandatory notification system

Background

Tuberculosis (TB) burden and the underreporting of TB remain major health challenges in Indonesia. Interest in the internet is growing extensively, and the introduction of the TB mandatory electronic notification system in 2017 engaged the public's interest to leverage digital traces regarding TB information in Indonesia.

Objective

To quantify the correlation between Google Trends data and Indonesian TB surveillance data before and after the implementation of a mandatory TB notification system.

Methods

Google Trends searches on TB information were used. We used two sets of time series data, including before and after the launch of the TB notification system. Pearson's correlation was used to measure the correlation between TB search terms and official TB reports.

Results

The moving average graph showed a linear pattern of TB information with TB reports after 2017. Pearson's correlation estimated a high correlation for TB definition, TB symptoms, and official TB reports with an R-value range of 0.97 to −1.00 (p ≤ 0.05) and showed an increasing trend in TB information searching after 2016.

Conclusion

Google Trends data can depict public interest in the TB epidemic. Validation of information-searching behavior is required to advocate the implementation of Google Trends for TB digital surveillance in Indonesia.