#EULAR2018: The Annual European Congress of Rheumatology—a Twitter hashtag analysis

The objective of this study was to explore the hashtag #EULAR2018 on Twitter during the period of the European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) Annual European Congress to better comprehend the implications and patterns of social media (SM) data and their possible impact on users interested in rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases. A mixed methods study combining SM performance data with qualitative content analysis of tweets was conducted. All the tweets publicly posted with #EULAR2018 were tracked using Symplur™ and Keyhole. Parameters such as number of users, engagement, reach, impressions, gender, source used to tweet, type of post, countries, trending topics, and main themes were analyzed. A total of 10,431 tweets using #EULAR2018 were tracked. Most of them were original and reached by > 2,950,000 users. Some of the retweets came from non-attendees to the congress. Males tweeted more than females; however, this gender disparity was not notable among the influential users. “Patients” were identified as the key topic. Sharing knowledge from the in situ congress, marketing or advertising, and sharing experiences or thoughts were identified as the main themes. Some dissonances between EULAR discourse and behavior that require further attention were identified. The EULAR congress is a staggering source of information with the potential of generating debate and promoting new practices in the rheumatology field, regardless of the place of origin of the users exposed to it, or whether or not the users attended the congress. EULAR should recognize the value and power of these data and incorporate them in the benchmarking of challenges and opportunities for the organization.