Assessment of Public Interest in CKD: A Google Trends Analysis

Background: Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) is a critical global health problem, that affects millions of patients worldwide, leading to severe health complications and increased mortality. Understanding the public interest in CKD is essential for awareness and prevention efforts. Google Trends serves as a valuable tool in this regard, offering insights into the general public’s search behaviors and interest patterns, providing a resource for healthcare professionals and policymakers to tailor their strategies more efficiently. Methods: Google Trends was utilized to analyze searches for the term “chronic kidney disease”, from January 2004 to January 2024, focusing on English-Language queries within the United States of America. The gathered data encompassed search frequency over time, location distribution, frequent topic of interest, and related searches. Search frequency is reported on a normalized scale, with a value of 100 representing peak in search popularity. Results: The number of google searches related to the term chronic kidney disease has significantly increased over time, from a mean of 14% in 2004 to 76% interest in 2024. Regarding interest by subregion in 2024, the state of West Virginia leads the frequency of searches, followed by South Dakota, Alabama, Tennessee and Mississippi. Top searched terms by frequency were the following: chronic kidney disease stage 3, chronic kidney disease treatment, what is kidney disease, assessment of kidney function, and dialysis. Conclusion: The substantial increase in Google searches for chronic kidney disease over the past two decades reflects a rising public interest and awareness of CKD. This trend, particularly pronounced in some geographic regions, highlights the public’s growing concern and need for information about CKD stages, treatments, and kidney function assessment. Physicians should integrate this information to provide better patient care by addressing common concerns, offering targeted education and tailoring prevention strategies.