Henrique Jose Pereira de Godoy1†Jose Maria Pereira de Godoy2*†- 1Vascular Surgery Discipline of the Medicine School in São do José do Rio Preto (FAMERP), São Paulo, Brazil
- 2Cardiology and Cardiovascular Surgery Department of the Medicine School in São José do Rio Preto (FAMERP), Head Vascular Surgery Discipline-FAMERP and Research CNPq (National Council for Research and Development), São José do Rio Preto, Brazil
A Commentary on
The reliability and quality of short videos as health information of guidance for lymphedema: a cross-sectional study
by Zhou, X., Ma, G., Su, X., Li, X., Wang, W., Xia, L., Yang, C., and Liu, B. (2025). Front. Public Health. 12:1472583. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1472583
Introduction
The interesting article entitled “The reliability and quality of short videos as health information of guidance for lymphedema: a cross-sectional study” (1), published in this journal reports on an extremely important subject related to treatment within health care, specifically in the areas of surgery and physiotherapy. Medical treatment must be based on scientific evidence, otherwise it cannot be considered a therapeutic option but rather an approach using guesswork, which is scientifically condemned.
Subsections
It is common on social media for people without sufficient knowledge of the scientific basis for treating lymphedema to ‘invent' a form of treatment and publish it in social networking sites. Laypeople, believing that it is a reliable form of treatment, begin to use it. Even non-specialist professionals have created methods without the slightest scientific basis or evidence and published them on social media platforms. This is the start of the destruction of the scientific foundations of medicine resulting in a loss of credibility.
Discussion
As a vascular surgeon and lymphology specialist with over 35 years of experience and extensive publications in the field, my team and I have observed that many online videos related to lymphology contain misinformation that could be detrimental to patients. This aligns with our daily clinical practice, where we see firsthand the negative consequences of inexperienced practitioners. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure the quality and accuracy of such videos.
When we analyze these videos, we need to have scientific knowledge of the content, so it is not the number of publications that is important, but the quality of the material. We must also examine how treatment techniques for these patients have advanced over the past century (2–5), evaluating the resulting improvements in patient outcomes and the innovative scientific approaches driving these changes. Because of improvements in scientific research, new techniques, new concepts and new materials are far superior in terms of results compared to the last century.
Specifically in lymphedema, we do not have favorable or contraindicating studies, in some other areas with other types of social platforms such as YouTube, Tick-Tok and in general the recommendation the videos and platforms should strengthen the management and professional supervision of related videos to accurately disseminate relevant knowledge to patients (6, 7). Just as we previously reported, the quality of the videos are role in health information dissemination expands, ensuring but must guarantee quality scientific and up-to-date content to better meet patients' needs for information.
In short, social media can do more harm to medicine than it contributes to the treatment of patients, and so warnings about these risks are of fundamental importance.
Author contributions
HP: Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. JP: Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing.
Funding
The author(s) declare that no financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Generative AI statement
The author(s) declare that no Gen AI was used in the creation of this manuscript.
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References
1. Zhou X, Ma G, Su X, Li X, Wang W, Xia L, et al. The reliability and quality of short videos as health information of guidance for lymphedema: a cross-sectional study. Front Public Health. (2025) 12:1472583. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1472583
2. Pereira de Godoy JM, Pereira de Godoy HJ, Pereira de Godoy AC, Guerreiro Godoy MF. Lymphedema and elephantiasis of the lower limbs: normalization or nearly normalization. Cureus. (2023) 15:e37519. doi: 10.7759/cureus.37519
3. Pereira de Godoy JM, Pereira de Godoy LM, Pereira de Godoy HJ, Guerreiro Godoy MF. Reduction of arm lymphedema using manual lymphatic therapy (Godoy Method). Cureus. (2022) 14:e28374. doi: 10.7759/cureus.28374
4. de Godoy ACP, de Godoy JMP, Guerreiro Godoy MF. Monotherapy for the treatment of lymphedema in children: a review. Curr Pediatr Rev. (2022) 18:179–81. doi: 10.2174/1573396318666220225143226
5. Pereira de Godoy JM, Guerreiro Godoy MF, Pereira de Godoy HJ, De Santi Neto D. Stimulation of synthesis and lysis of extracellular matrix proteins in fibrosis associated with lymphedema. Dermatopathology. (2021) 9:1–10. doi: 10.3390/dermatopathology9010001
6. Wang J, Liu B, Yang G, Luo Y, Lv N, Shu X, et al. Assessing the content and quality of GI bleeding information on Bilibili, TikTok, and YouTube: a cross-sectional study. Sci Rep. (2025) 15:14856. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-98364-7
Keywords: lymphedema, short videos, health, information, guidance
Citation: Pereira de Godoy HJ and Pereira de Godoy JM (2025) Commentary: The reliability and quality of short videos as health information of guidance for lymphedema: a cross-sectional study. Front. Public Health 13:1605011. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1605011
Received: 29 April 2025; Accepted: 09 June 2025;
Published: 30 June 2025.
Edited by:
Yanwu Xu, Baidu, ChinaReviewed by:
Aboudou Habirou Kifouly, University of Ibadan, NigeriaCopyright © 2025 Pereira de Godoy and Pereira de Godoy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
*Correspondence: Jose Maria Pereira de Godoy, Z29kb3lqbXBAZ21haWwuY29t
†ORCID: Henrique Jose Pereira de Godoy orcid.org/0000-0001-9463-7608
Jose Maria Pereira de Godoy orcid.org/0000-0001-5424-7787