What it is like living with MS was presented through descriptions of daily life. One patient, created a humorous, yet poignant, ‘day in the life of’ video to
show the lived reality of MS from her perspective. Aspirations, such as returning to work or engaging in leisure pursuits, were discussed in relation to the restrictions MS placed on these activities. Therefore, when actual symptoms were described and demonstrated they were done so in the context of a person with a life rather than as an anonymous number in a clinical trial. Moreover, in different channels you can view other videos the channel owner has commented on or provided links to. While often MS related, these included other topics of interest, such as music, pets, humorous videos, and so Erismodegib MK0683 cell line on. Sometimes, video posters engaged in dialogue with each other, explicitly mentioning other people’s videos (again, this was most commonly the case in experiential video diaries), creating a sense of community. This ‘subjectivity’ did not weaken the legitimacy of the videos, but, judging from the comments posted in response to them, for many people it strengthened it. For instance, in response to a positive pre/post demonstration
video: ‘god bless u, i am so happy for u. Im getting liberated in a week and you gave me hope & strength, i was about to choke up lol, god bless u! and i am hoping to join you real soon!’ (posted in response to personal treatment evidence video; female; channel 5; video A). Discussion between the video Resminostat poster and viewers was common and in cases of videos done pre or post ‘liberation’ this was often requests for information about how the patient was doing, well wishes or exclamations about how the video had inspired them to seek out the procedure. While it is not possible to tell from our analysis if these videos are actually affecting patient decision making, the high number of views and extensive comments they receive indicate that, along with other sources of information, they are playing a role. This suggests that patients were making decisions based,
at least in part, on what they see on YouTube and their communication with other patients. The most viewed CCSVI videos on YouTube were overwhelmingly positive towards the theory and the ‘liberation’ procedure. This contrasts with the skeptical perspective of many in the medical community, a number of research findings and many national MS societies [36], [37] and [38]. Zamboni and other researchers have, however, continued to publish positive findings [12][39], [40] and [41]. While the videos we analyzed were markedly positive, we are not suggesting this be read as an assessment of treatment effectiveness – something that remains contested. Indeed, we recognize that there is a bias towards reporting positive results, both in research and the media [42] and [43].