Aim: To characterize Yelp reviews about pain management and opioids.
Methods: We manually coded and applied natural language processing to 836 Yelp reviews of US hospitals mentioning an opioid medication.
Results: Yelp reviews by patients and caregivers describing experiences with pain management and opioids had lower ratings compared with other reviews. Negative descriptions of pain management and opioid-related experiences were more commonly described than positive experiences, and the number of themes they reflected was more diverse.
Conclusion: Yelp reviews offer insights into pain management and opioid use that are not assessed by traditional surveys. As a free, highly utilized source of unstructured narratives, Yelp may allow ongoing assessment of policies related to pain management and opioid use.
Keywords: Yelp; pain assessment; pain management; social media; opioids.