YouTube has launched a new feature to help users quickly find actionable and easy-to-follow videos for basic first aid and emergency care from authoritative health organizations.
Viewers searching for certain acute health topics will now see a pinned shelf titled “First aid from health sources” at the top of search results, featuring short explainer videos. YouTube Health partnered with Mass General Brigham and the Mexican Red Cross on the content.
The information shelves will appear for topics including opioid overdose, seizure, heart attack, psychosis, CPR, choking, bleeding, stroke, snake bite, tourniquet, suicide and poisoning. They are launching in the U.S. in English and Spanish, with additional countries and languages to come.
Mass General Brigham was an early pilot tester of YouTube’s AI-powered dubbing tool called Aloud. It can now share critical health information in Spanish as part of the latest announcement.
“Our system is committed to providing credible, trusted information to our patients and, more broadly, to people seeking knowledge around the world,” Merranda Logan, M.D., associate chief academic officer at Mass General Brigham, said in a press release. “We are thrilled to expand our YouTube educational series to include step-by-step basic first aid and emergency care videos in multiple languages.”
YouTube Health also worked with the American Heart Association (AHA) to publish a CPR course, available for free on its platform, to help people without a medical background learn CPR. The idea is for viewers to participate in a more in-depth structured learning experience. A Spanish-language version of that course will be available starting in February on the AHA’s channel.
Since its launch in 2020, YouTube Health’s mission has been to put high-quality health content at people’s fingertips. Some features to date have ranged from health labels to identify licensed medical professionals to crisis resource panels for viewers in times of distress.