Tik Tok is brimming with hundreds of thousands of online fans with videos from NHS staff that deliver information on a range of health topics.
From women’s health, sleep and anxiety to urging people to get the Covid vaccine, they’re using music and dance to liven up the social media videos.
Nyrah Saleem, a pharmacist aged 24, has accrued more than 65,000 followers in two months. She sees the videos as a way to help more people than she can reach face to face at Mount Chambers Surgery in Braintree, Essex.
“My aim was always to connect with the community and make a change through being fun — not just reeling off textbook lines. It’s a good way to get young people listening,” she told the Sunday Mirror. She helps people understand why they get dark kneecaps and also provides advice on how to reduce bloating and treat acne.
Nighat Arif, a GP who appears on daytime TV, has nearly 145,000 TikTok followers. Some four million TikTok users watch the NHS surgeon Karan Rajan give medical tips on a range of topics including how to treat sunburn or sleep better at night.
The BMA public health medicine committee has said that such TikTok videos could “help reduce the health inequalities which have widened in the last decade”.
