Table 1.
Categorized Twitter accounts (relevant Twitter accounts with ≥500 followers on July 15, 2013).
| Type of Twitter account | Search words | Total no. of accounts | ||||
| Byoin (hospital) | Shinryojo (clinic) | Lin (clinic) | Kurinikku (clinic) | |||
| Accounts related to medicine |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Medical institutions | 30 | 6 | 67 | 65 | 168 |
|
|
Pharmacies | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
|
|
Doctors, dentists | 86 | 12 | 39 | 53 | 190 |
|
|
Nurses, midwives | 35 | 1 | 0 | 6 | 42 |
|
|
Paramedics (except nurses) | 71 | 1 | 10 | 5 | 87 |
|
|
Other hospital personnel | 68 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 82 |
|
|
Tweets about medical knowledgea | 18 | 0 | 6 | 5 | 29 |
|
|
Patients | 11 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 13 |
|
|
Total | 321 | 24 | 126 | 142 | 613 |
| Accounts unrelated to medicine | 356 | 31 | 58 | 153 | 598 | |
| Total no. of accounts | 677 | 55 | 184 | 295 | 1211 | |
aThe accounts’ proprietors were unknown.