PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Liu, Fangwei
AU  - Allan, G. Michael
AU  - Korownyk, Christina
AU  - Kolber, Michael
AU  - Flook, Nigel
AU  - Sternberg, Harvey
AU  - Garrison, Scott
TI  - Seasonality of Ankle Swelling: Population Symptom Reporting Using Google Trends
AID  - 10.1370/afm.1953
DP  - 2016 Jul 01
TA  - The Annals of Family Medicine
PG  - 356--358
VI  - 14
IP  - 4
4099  - http://www.annfammed.org/content/14/4/356.short
4100  - http://www.annfammed.org/content/14/4/356.full
SO  - Ann Fam Med2016 Jul 01; 14
AB  - In our experience, complaints of ankle swelling are more common in summer, typically from patients with no obvious cardiovascular disease. Surprisingly, this observation has never been reported. To objectively establish this phenomenon, we sought evidence of seasonality in the public’s Internet searches for ankle swelling. Our data, obtained from Google Trends, consisted of all related Google searches in the United States from January 4, 2004, to January 26, 2016. Consistent with our expectations and confirmed by similar data for Australia, Internet searches for information on ankle swelling are highly seasonal (highest in midsummer), with seasonality explaining 86% of search volume variability.