The portrayal of bone tumours in the press

The media are pivotal in educating and informing the general public. The stories they cover and how they cover them has a powerful influence on public perceptions. There have been no previous reports of the portrayal of bone tumours in the press. LexisNexis™ Professional search engine used to retrieve articles from all United Kingdom National Newspapers over one year containing terms “bone tumour/bone tumour” and 46 other named bone and joint tumours from May 2009 to May 2010. A total of 253 relevant articles were found. Seven per cent solely bone tumour related, 41 % main theme and 52 % mentioned in passing. 52 % mentioned tumour type. These were 51 % multiple myeloma, 15 % Ewing’s sarcoma, 9 % sarcoma unspecified, 6 % clear cell sarcoma, 4.5 % epithelial sarcoma, 4 % synovial sarcoma, 3 % osteosarcoma, 3 % bony metastasis and 1.5 % chondrosarcoma. Benign bone tumours not mentioned. Article focus: chemotherapy 17 %, surgeon/doctor 7 % and new surgical technique 2 %. The overall attitudinal tone of the articles were 52 % negative, 32 % neutral and 16 % positive. Only 13 % quoted an oncologist, and 1 % an orthopaedic surgeon. Quality of medical information provided was limited with 90 % providing no meaningful medical information and this medical information being correct only 68 % of the time. Articles with quotes from a doctor were significantly more likely to contain meaningful medical information than those without—33 versus 4 %, respectively (p < 0.001 Chi-squared test)—and there was a trend for them to be more factually correct overall—68 versus 50 % (p = 0.192 Fisher’s exact Test).