Gage Skidmore, Flickr CC
Gage Skidmore, Flickr CC

'Stranger Things' star raises awareness of rare disorder

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Following each season of Netflix's Stranger Things, public awareness of a rare disorder peaked online. Gaten Matarazzo III, who plays Dustin Henderson, was born with cleidocranial dysplasia, which can result in missing or abnormal growth of teeth and collarbones. Matarazzo has spoken about the disorder, helped set up a foundation to promote awareness, and his character has discussed it on the show. Using data from Google Trends, researchers were able to track a peak in searches about the disorder after the release of each of the three seasons of Stranger Things.

Journal/conference: JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery

Link to research (DOI): 10.1001/jamaoto.2019.4791

Organisation/s: Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences, USA

Funder: US Department of Health and Human Services Office of Research Integrity and the Oklahoma Center for the Advancement of Science and Technology.

Media Release

From: JAMA

The actor who plays Dustin Henderson on the popular Netflix series “Stranger Things” was born with cleidocranial dysplasia (CCD), a rare disorder of which the most prominent features are missing or abnormal growth of the teeth and collarbones. The fictional character shares the condition with actor Gaten Matarazzo III and the show has featured scenes of Matarazzo’s Dustin educating others about it. The authors of this research letter used data from Google Trends and CCD-related foundations  to gauge public interest and awareness of the disorder after the release of each of the show’s three seasons. Researchers report that each season of the show was associated with an increase in weekly search interest for CCD above what would be expected. Data from most CCD-related foundations contacted weren’t quantifiable but web traffic to one site for a CCD-related information page reached 10,000 visits the week after the show’s third season premiered last summer. While study authors urge writers to exercise cautious when portraying characters with rare disorders, those portrayals might help to raise awareness of these conditions.

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