Abstract
Canine pruritus, or itching, is a common clinical sign of multiple dermatological conditions in dogs. This study explored global changes in online sentiment towards canine pruritic treatments since the launch of Apoquel® (oclacitinib) in 2013 and CYTOPOINT® (lokivetmab) in 2015. Using the Pulsar social listening platform, English-language posts from the social media platform Twitter/X were collected and analysed from two five-year periods: pre-launch (2009–2013) and post-launch (2018–2022). A proprietary Surrey DataHub filtering pipeline was applied, incorporating duplicate removal, heuristic keyword screening, and a zero-shot large language model classifier to identify relevant posts. Sentiment analysis was performed using a custom-built classifier that categorised tweets by sentiment expressed towards pruritic treatments. From approximately 70,000 tweets, 3,304 were identified as relevant. Results showed a 15.8 ± 2.3% increase in positive sentiment and a 6.7 ± 2.4% decrease in negative sentiment following the introduction of Apoquel® and CYTOPOINT®. These findings indicate a significant shift in public perception, with increasing optimism surrounding treatment options for canine pruritus. The observed trends likely reflect improved therapeutic efficacy and growing awareness of innovative dermatological interventions. This study demonstrates the value of AI-enhanced social media listening in assessing public sentiment towards veterinary therapeutics and contributes to a broader understanding of how digital discourse reflects evolving owner attitudes towards animal health.