The Digital Wellness Dilemma: Why Millions Trust Influencers Over Doctors

I haven’t had a consistent primary care doctor since turning 18 and moving on from my childhood pediatrician. Though I get yearly physicals, it’s typically with a new doctor each time, depending on my location, insurance coverage, and which office actually answers the phone after numerous calls and endless hold music. When appointments finally happen, they’re often cold, clinical experiences in sterile rooms with doctors who are strangers to me.

Meanwhile, wellness influencers effortlessly float across social media, making longevity, glowing skin, and robust health seem as simple as taking a supplement with your morning lemon water. In this digital landscape, answers to our pressing medical questions have never seemed so accessible and alluring.

This struggle to find quality healthcare information and providers is widespread. According to a 2023 study by the National Association of Community Health Centers and the American Academy of Family Physicians, over 100 million Americans—nearly one-third of the population—face barriers accessing primary care, a number that has almost doubled since 2014.

Dr. Mike Varshavski, known to his 29 million social media followers as “Doctor Mike,” points to multiple factors driving this healthcare accessibility crisis. These include independent family medicine practices closing or being absorbed by larger healthcare systems, declining insurance reimbursement rates, and the overwhelming administrative burden facing physicians. With family medicine ranking among the lowest-paying medical specialties, fewer medical students pursue this critical field.

The obstacles to accessing primary care loom even larger for women and communities of color, particularly Black women, who are more likely to experience medical gaslighting, making them less likely to trust physicians in the future.

Trust in healthcare institutions has been steadily eroding for decades. “Survey data indicates that trust in institutionalized expertise has been in decline in the US since the 1950s,” explains Stephanie Alice Baker, associate professor of sociology at City St George’s, University of London. “Throughout the late 20th century, a series of scandals involving the pharmaceutical and food industries has sown distrust about the financial and political motives of scientific and medical institutions.”

The COVID-19 pandemic further deepened this mistrust. According to the Pew Research Center, confidence in scientists acting in the public’s best interests dropped by 14% between April 2020 and fall 2023.

The Rise of Digital Wellness Culture

In this trust vacuum, social media platforms now host tens of millions of videos featuring people whose lives have allegedly improved through wellness rituals or products. These influencers collectively promote a multi-trillion-dollar wellness industry encompassing everything from mental wellness and nutrition to alternative medicine, beauty products, and more.

However, these compelling videos don’t always prioritize viewers’ best interests. The wellness content spectrum ranges from medical professionals with corporate sponsorships to influencers with little or no medical training promoting products through paid partnerships, often prioritizing profit over legitimate health benefits.

While the Federal Trade Commission requires that relationships between influencers and brands be disclosed, these wellness videos often create the impression that every aspect of health is completely within individual control.

“What wellness influencers do very well is make it seem like if you do X, you will be healthier,” explains Jessica B. Steier, who holds a doctorate in public health and hosts the Unbiased Science podcast. “It makes people feel like they have a ton of control over their health, and that’s empowering.”

It’s no wonder we get drawn down these digital rabbit holes, potentially encountering misinformation if the influencer lacks proper credentials—or worse, is intentionally misleading audiences.

When Misinformation Goes Viral

As a health and wellness journalist for over a decade, I’ve covered countless wellness trends. What I’ve consistently learned from medical experts is that good health fundamentally depends on basic practices like balanced nutrition, regular exercise, adequate sleep, stress management, and community connection—not the trendy quick fixes that make wellness products so marketable.

The obstacles to finding a trusted primary care physician can be frustrating, but having a medical expert you can rely on is essential to avoid depending on uncredentialed influencers promoting the latest wellness trends, potentially putting your health at risk.

Brian Southwell, a distinguished fellow and lead scientist for public understanding of science at RTI International, defines misinformation as “information that asserts or implies claims that are inconsistent with the weight of accepted scientific evidence at the time.”

One notorious source of health misinformation was Australian influencer Belle Gibson, who falsely claimed to have terminal brain cancer that she was healing naturally through diet rather than conventional treatments. Her deception led to a successful wellness app and cookbook that earned her half a million dollars in less than two years.

Similarly, fitness influencer Brian Johnson, known as “Liver King,” promoted consuming raw animal organs and his supplement line while claiming his muscular physique came from an “ancestral” lifestyle. In reality, leaked emails revealed he had been using steroids and human growth hormone.

The consequences of following misleading health advice can be devastating. Paloma Shemirani died at age 23 from a heart attack caused by an untreated tumor after rejecting chemotherapy in favor of alternative treatments recommended by her mother, a known anti-vaccine influencer.

The current information landscape has become even more complex with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s appointment as US Secretary of Health and Human Services, despite having no medical background. Kennedy surrounds himself with wellness influencers who promote his “Make America Healthy Again” agenda.

Why might people trust wellness influencers more than physicians? The 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer Special Report found that people consider someone a legitimate health expert not only when they have academic training but also when they have personal health experiences.

“People trust information from people who are similar to them or at least can empathize with their own cultural or personal experiences,” explains Dr. Garth Graham, cardiologist and global head of healthcare partnerships at YouTube and Google Health.

Among the 73% of Edelman report participants who regularly see clinicians, 53% feel their doctor is “slightly or not qualified” to address all their health concerns. When doctors can’t address an issue, 65% turn to non-institutional sources like friends, family, online searches, and social media.

According to a 2025 KFF health information tracking poll, 55% of American adults use social media to access health information at least occasionally, with higher percentages among young adults and Black and Latinx communities. Young adults aged 18-34 are twice as likely as those over 55 to follow uncredentialed health advice, with 58% saying they’ve regretted a health decision made based on misinformation.

The Persuasive Power of Digital Wellness

The average American spends about two hours daily on social media, where they encounter influencers who appear approachable and relatable. “They start to develop this parasocial relationship where they think they actually know this person when, really, they don’t,” explains Dr. Zachary Rubin, a pediatric allergist with nearly 4 million social media followers.

These virtual relationships can become surprisingly powerful—you might listen to an influencer for hours, compared to just 15 minutes with your physician.

Wellness influencers often speak with unwavering confidence, provide simple solutions to complex problems, and oversimplify nuanced information. “The three A’s (the impression of authenticity, accessibility, and autonomy) are central to how influencers establish trust and intimacy with their followers,” explains Baker.

The financial impact can be substantial. A February 2025 University of Sydney study examining about 1,000 Instagram and TikTok posts promoting popular medical tests—including full-body MRIs and genetic screenings—found that around 70% of content creators promoting these often unproven tests had direct financial interests in them.

“It creates so many inequities in the healthcare system,” says Brooke Nickel, one of the study’s authors. “It really plays on this emotion of early detection and early screening in the hope of living your best life…but there’s no evidence to support those tests.”

The Healthcare System Responds

To counter the tide of misinformation, the World Health Organization created Fides, a network of over 1,200 credentialed health professionals who create evidence-based health content. Named after the Roman goddess of trust, Fides aims to counteract health misinformation through coordinated campaigns and professional training.

“The idea is to create a movement similar to the antivax movement, which is small but very powerful, well-coordinated, and well-funded,” explains Andrew Pattison, team lead of digital channels in the WHO’s Department of Digital Health and Innovation.

The impact of concentrated misinformation can be substantial. In 2021, the Center for Countering Digital Hate found that just 12 anti-vaccine influencers—the “disinformation dozen”—were responsible for up to 65% of anti-vaccine content on Facebook and Twitter.

Dr. Varshavski recognized early that medical information online often failed to engage audiences effectively. “What was captivating was all the people trying to sell miracle products,” he explains. His solution was to adopt the engaging presentation styles of wellness influencers while ensuring his content remained scientifically accurate.

Social media platforms have established varying policies to combat misinformation. TikTok works with fact-checking organizations to prohibit harmful false content, while Meta removes misinformation likely to cause imminent physical harm and recently launched Community Notes for user-guided fact-checking. YouTube created YouTube Health, featuring content from verified medical experts.

As we navigate this complex landscape, experts emphasize the need for digital literacy and critical thinking. “We need to think critically about what we’re encountering when we scroll,” says Rubin, who suggests pausing before sharing content that evokes strong emotional reactions, as this sharing behavior fuels algorithmic amplification of potentially misleading information.

The fundamental challenge remains addressing why people turn to social media for health answers in the first place—because they lack access to trusted healthcare providers. This problem is expected to worsen, with the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis projecting a shortage of 87,150 primary care physicians by 2037.

Between navigating misinformation and accessing our current healthcare system, frustration is natural. Yet we must continue thinking critically about the content we consume while pursuing evidence-based health information. After all, our search for health answers represents something profoundly human: a desire for control, a fear of mortality, and the fundamental will to live—feelings we all share.