Social Media in Health Communication Fields - Research Paper Example

Social Media in Health Communication Fields and Social Media in Health Communication Fields Introduction The social media can be defined as a new media whose set of channels is characterized by interactivity among communication participants, generation of content by the users and highly multi-directional flow of communication (Etyan et al, 2011). Some of the most popular social media tools include social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, blogs, content sharing sites such as YouTube and Vevo and specialized online communities. The traditional media, for example the print media, did not feature the aforementioned characteristics as most of the content was generated by the publisher; the public was merely a passive consumer of information. Information was flowing in one direction only, and even if there were replies they were not instant like in the case of the social media (Park, Rodgers and Stemmle, 2011). The social media has revolutionized the way people generate, disseminate and even appreciate information because of its unique abilities. First, it is device indifferent. As long as a person has internet access one can access the social media through different devices such as mobile phones, desktops, laptops, tablets and smart phones among others. The social media also enables communication in different perspectives, from one-to-one communication to one-to-many. Most importantly, the social media allows for real time communication and different levels of interactivity and engagement. These unique characteristics and capabilities have made the social media a popular media across the globe and across the different sectors of the global economy. The health sector is one of the sectors that have been influenced by the use of social media (OED, 2013). Here, the social media has revolutionized how people get health information and how health information is disseminated by health experts. The social media has proved to be a reliable media that is highly efficient in getting health-related information out. Currently, health messages are already forming a substantial part of messages being conveyed through the many social media platforms. This paper investigates the different ways the social media is being used in the health communication fields to disseminate information. The paper shows the influence this use of social media has on the people’s attitudes and knowledge as far as their health and health services are concerned. Social media use in the Health Communication Fields A research conducted in 2012 by Cogitamus about the use of social media in the health sector established that nearly 32% of the adults use the social media to communicate health-related messages (NHS, 2012). The research predicted a 31% increment every year. The research also established that nearly 90% of the internet users have, at some point in their internet use, searched for or disseminated health-related information (NHS, 2012). This shows that the social media has etched itself as an integral part of health communication. The social media in the health sector is applied in four broad categories; communications, information sharing, clinical outcomes and speed innovation. Communication needs involves issues like marketing, brand management, reputation management, consumer relations and recruitment (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). Information sharing involves the use of social media to educate patients and creating online communities among others. Clinical outcomes involve the use of social media to coordinate and manage the patients; progress and their wellness. Lastly, to speed innovation the social media in the health sector is used to recruit clinical trial volunteers, enable research collaboration and enable surveillance and product development (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). Marketing The social media is extensively being used for marketing purposes in the health sector. Marketing is one of the communication functions of the social media and, if done correctly, can improve a brand image, increase the user loyalty and drive sales upward (Grajales et al, 2014). In the health sector, pharmaceutical companies are the ones with the higher prevalence to utilize the social media for marketing purposes. These firms can set up Facebook and Twitter accounts from where they can advertise their products to their audience. As Gravales et al (2014) note, the social media can be a useful tool in creating hype around a product launch. Studies indicate that the social media is more effective at getting the message out than the traditional media. Right now, it is easier to make people aware about your product by posting about it on Twitter than it is placing an advert on a national or a metropolis newspaper or broadcast media (CSC, 2013). The fact that the online audience is an active rather than a passive information consumer means that the advert created on a social media platform can have an exponential influence. For instance, just posting a link to a blog on Twitter may have the followers retweeting that link which helps disseminate the information being conveyed. This influence cannot be compared to one reading an advert on a newspaper or magazine and then talking about it to his friend. The multi-directionality of the social media tools means that the target market horizon gets expanded (Burke-Garcia and Sally, 2014). All internet users become a large potential target audience since number of internet users as a potential target market is way higher than the number of newspaper or magazine buyers or radio listeners. To make utmost use of the social media for marketing purposes, health institutions can use the social media to post news items. They can also use the social media to promote upcoming events and drive campaigns aimed at achieving public awareness and encourage their followers to help disseminate that information (Etyan et al, 2011). Lastly, even though the internet users tend to be from diverse background, ages and races, they tend to group themselves into groups with similar interests. A firm can take advantage of this grouping to market its product to a particular group and maximize their sales by being more specific in their marketing (Burke-Garcia and Scally, 2014). For example, a pharmaceutical company manufacturing cancer drugs can target a specific market like an online community made up of cancer patients and sell the drugs to them optimizing their sales in the process. Brand and Reputation Management Closely related to the use of social media for marketing is the use of social media for brand and reputation management. A social networking site is not only a tool for information dissemination but also an important platform for managing an organization’s reputation through communication (NHS, 2012). Brand and reputation of an organization can be enhanced only through the promotion of interactivity between its clientele and itself; the social media presents a perfect platform and opportunity to enable this. An organization can, for instance, use its social networking sites like Facebook or Twitter accounts to post pictures of events or projects it has undertaken. This communication helps create a picture about the organization and can be used to generate goodwill on the part of the clients (Park, Rodgers and Stemmle, 2011). An organization can also set up a blog where interested parties can find relevant information. The discussion that takes place can help reduce the number of unnecessary hospital visits as some of the issues can be addressed by experts online. When patients have to visit the hospital it will be only because their problems could not be solved online and this makes their visits more fruitful (Etyan et al, 2011). Time is saved, the hospital’s efficiency is enhanced and so is their brand image and reputation. Furthermore, an organization can prepare videos and presentations and upload them on a YouTube account to show their accomplishments and further enhance their positive brand image. Reputation is key for any organization as it determines how clients will relate to the organization. Firms in the health sector are extremely disadvantaged in that the attitude towards healthcare organizations is usually negative (NHS, 2012). The healthcare organizations have the onus to enforce a good reputation. They have to actively build a positive reputation and show their clients why they are different from the rest who are under the blanket condemnation. One of the most effective ways of enhancing a positive reputation is by replying to clients’ comments and complaints (Andersen and Soderqvist, 2012). Most healthcare users were used to the old systems where they were asked to fill forms about a particular organization and make known their thoughts towards the healthcare services they have received and later drop the form at the suggestions and complaints box. These suggestions and complaints were not acted upon and the clients could not even tell whether the organization’s management has acknowledged their complaints (CSC, 2012). The social media has changed this. If the management has acknowledged a complaint, the client is able to tell for example through a Facebook like and reply or through a Twitter retweet and reply. According to Park, Rodgers and Stemmle (2011), many patients are increasingly taking to online social networking sites to express their dissatisfaction with healthcare services they have received. Some of the patients do not even bother to use the traditional means of airing complaints preferring to use tech savvy means to air complaints. Smarter organizations have already established that real conversations nowadays take place in the social media while smart clients have realized that for their complaints to have a higher probability of being acted upon they have to be relayed online through the social media, for example by tweeting an organization or posting on their Facebook wall where it is hard for the management to ignore it (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). A hospital monitoring its social networks can have a unique opportunity to manage its relations with its patients. Using social media management dashboards such as HootSuite, Alerti and SocialFlow an organization can track its every mention in the social media (Beuscart-Zephir, Jaspers and Kuziemsky, 2013). This helps identify and respond to client’s complaints in an instant and enhance their reputation as an organization that is sensitive to its client’s complaints. To further enhance brand image and reputation, a healthcare organization can recruit online ambassadors to vouch for them (CSC, 2012). These are patients who have received medical care from the healthcare institutions and were satisfied with the services they received. The organization, through these ambassadors can communicate a positive image and enhance their positive reputation by having these agents put out a positive word for them when the organization is in a crisis. Patient education Healthcare organizations can also use the social media to provide educational content to the general public (HNS, 2012). This is probably the most apparent use of the social media in health communication. A lot of people, even non-experts, are setting up blogs and post health-related information that is meant to educate its audience. Sharing health information for educational purposes has formed one of the major challenges of using social media tools in the health sector as a lot of information that is not credible is being generated and disseminated (Burke-Garcia and Scally, 2014). Non-experts are posting health information that is not evidence-based. An organization can use the social media to communicate evidence-based content to its patients and the general public (Grajales et al, 2014). It can create demonstration videos and upload them on a video sharing site such as YouTube or Vevo. It can also set up an official blog where its physicians and other experts on several subjects can post educational content on different topics. Such blogs not only get the message out to the public but also solicit for replies and advance a discussion. This interaction also provides a perfect opportunity for physicians to learn from the community, for example their level of knowledge on a particular health issue or an attitude towards an issue explicated in the blog post (OECD, 2013). Since there are many people setting up blogs to communicate health-related information, it is natural that people will gravitate towards the blogs set up by health institutions because their information is deemed to be more credible by virtue of having a quality management system to monitor the content being disseminated. Workforce Recruitment The social media offers a prospect of a wide pool of labor with people of a wide range of capabilities, skills, and knowledge. A healthcare organization can use a social media to disseminate workforce recruitment information (Andersen and Soderqvist, 2012). Some hospitals are already advertising for positions of subordinate staff in the social media sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Facebook and Twitter can be used to advertise for positions that do not require professional knowledge to fill. LinkedIn, on the other hand, is suited to scout for professional talent. Park, Rodgers and Stemmle (2011) note that even though most organizations have not started scouting for professional talent in such sites, the trend is bound to change in the near future. Still, healthcare organizations can use specialized professional networking sites to advertise for job vacancies to be filled by professional healthcare providers. In the US the two most popular professional healthcare sites are Doximity and Sermo (NHS, 2012). Here hospitals can advertise their job vacancies, and since this is a site that is highly specialized, the probability of finding the right talent that is best suited for the job and its environments is greatly heightened. Firms that have scouted for talents in the social media assert that they have been able to save around US $ 300,000 annually (Park, Rodgers and Stemmle, 2011). The social media saves the money that would have otherwise been splashed on the broadcast and the print media to advertise for job vacancies. Clinical Trial Recruitment Apart from using the social media sites to recruit professional and non-professional talent, healthcare organizations also use these sites to scout for volunteers for their clinical trials (CSC, 2012). These organizations can advertise in their Facebook or Twitter accounts that they require volunteers for certain projects. The WHO is one of the organizations that have already taken to the social media to net potential volunteers. The social media, being a rich pool of potential volunteers is able to provide many volunteers in a short period of time. Time is saved as a result. Furthermore, it saves on the cost that would have been used to advertise or otherwise scout for the volunteers. The ability to reach millions in one second and the prospect of getting an instant reply is mouth watering to healthcare organizations (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). Clinical trials target young people are especially bound to benefit since they form the larger percentage of the social media population. Online communities make netting the right volunteers even easier. An organization just has to advertise the volunteering positions in a targeted online community. For instance, when MediciGlobal wanted volunteers who are suffering from cancer for their clinical trials it advertised for these positions in an online community for patients suffering from cancer (NHS, 2012). The response and applications they got for those positions was overwhelming even for the management to handle and they had to turn down so many of the would-be volunteers. The instant replies, cost effective and tailored advertising makes the use of social media for clinical trial recruitment apt. Community Creation Through community creation healthcare organizations can assemble patients with common characteristics and communicate to them in a much simpler and easier way (Andersen and Soderqvist, 2012; NHS, 2012). These communities are virtual and cut across different geographical, racial, age and cultural barriers. The members are brought together by a common interest or a common characteristic, for example, an online community made up of people suffering from chronic illnesses such as hypertension or cancer. Online communities may also be made up of professionals in the healthcare sector and not necessarily patients. Online communities can be used by healthcare organization to share specific information. The members can also share information with one another or query the online administrator who is usually a healthcare professional who then responds to their questions. In the US, PatientsLikeMe is the most popular online community (NHS, 2012). Patients with a wide range of illnesses can register and connect via this platform. Apart from the fact that they can share their stories and seek for expert information the members can also offer and receive emotional support from fellow members and healthcare professionals. The value of encouragement and other forms of emotional support cannot be overstated when it comes to health matters (OECD, 2013). Some people, especially those suffering from acute chronic diseases, really need this support to make it through. The detailing of instances where a disease has been defeated gives patients suffering from similar illnesses Patients have the option of creating their personalized profiles on which they can provide details on their health conditions and even their progress. Through viewing the content documented on other people’s profiles, members can find information on the best possible treatment programs to undertake or doctors to consult. Furthermore, hospitals can collaborate with the various online communities to provide information and diagnoses (Grajales et al, 2014). That way, a lot of time that would have been used visiting the hospital can be saved as diagnosis can be secured online. Research Collaboration Apart from enabling communication between healthcare providers and patients or patients-to-patients communication, social media also enables collaboration between researchers in the medical fields (NHS, 2012). Researches become more effective if collaborative efforts are leveraged. Social networking sites, for example gaming sites, are a perfect example where a medical mystery can be solved by designing the medical problem as a game and let the gamers try to unravel the mystery. Social networking sites can, therefore, be the tool that speeds medical breakthroughs without much struggle (Beuscart-Zephir, Jaspers and Kuziemsky, 2013). Additionally, the social media tools can provide a platform where researchers can engage one another in a multi-disciplinary context. The information shared through a Twitter account or a Facebook account provides a learning opportunity for health professionals and researchers. Being a highly unregulated environment, the social media is capable of taking conversation and debates among researchers in an unspecified direction and this, in turn, presents an opportunity of generating new research ideas (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). Also, being an arrangement that includes people from varied geographical areas, it is possible that some information from one part of the globe can prove to be an insight in another. Information can be shared in form of consultations and opinions can be sought too. For instance, a physician can upload x-ray images on the site and provide his opinions and solicit for others’. Patient Monitoring Health organizations and individual healthcare practitioners can use the social media to monitor how their patients are progressing with their treatment programs (CSC, 2012). The doctor asks how the patient is doing and the patient answers through the same platform without the need of visual contact. Routine checkups that do not require physical examination can also be conducted through a social media site provided there is confidentiality (Etyan et al, 2011). This reduces the number of unexpected hospital visits by patients. Through these sites, physicians can also remind their patients to take their drugs so that they do not fail to adhere to their medication. The connection through the social media enables the physicians to personalize their care and act as guardians to their patients. Physicians can also use the social media sites to galvanize support for their patients by their relatives. As earlier indicated, it is extremely crucial that patients feel they have the support of their healthcare providers and their close family members. Through the social media, physicians can monitor how the patients are progressing emotionally (NHS, 2012). If they read despair in the patient’s tone they can seek ways and means to encourage them, one of them being to ask their close relatives to provide the much-needed encouragement and support. Apart from monitoring patient’s progress, healthcare providers can also use the social media sites to conduct surveys and collect research data on various health issues (Burke-Garcia and Scally, 2014). As noted earlier, the social media presents a unique population, some of which is so ever willing to participate in such surveys. Data collection becomes easier, faster and cheaper. A disease can also be monitored through social media surveys. Disease progressions can also be monitored through disseminating and collecting data from social networking sites (Noor and Hendricks, 2013). For instance, if the number of the members in an online community designed for those with hypertension condition, it may be a pointer that the incidence of hypertension in a country or a particular society is increasing. The reverse can also be true. Disease progression information can inform the direction of medical research studies. Through the social media and audience feedbacks, a health organization and a pharmaceutical firm can be able to tell the effectiveness of a drug that has been introduced into the market (NHS, 2012). Additionally, if the drug has any side effects or does not satisfy some aspects of the study, it would be possible for the drug manufacturer to tell and make amends for the drug to have maximum effectiveness. Lastly, the social media can effectively be utilized by medical practitioners to disseminate information about wellness of an individual, especially the younger population (OECD, 2013). Issues like mental health, adolescence and sexuality and drug abuse can be tackled on these forums. These topics are extremely important and need to be addressed, yet the target population is a hard-to-find one. The social media is the only platform that provides this access and healthcare providers are using it to optimize their reach. The Influence on People’s Health Attitudes and Knowledge The power of the social media to influence people’s attitudes and behaviors has never been in doubt. If used correctly, the social media can harvest an organization favorable sentiment from the public. Healthcare organizations have for so long being perceived as inefficient in their operations and wasteful in their operations (Burke-Garcia and Scally, 2014). They are also increasingly being viewed as lacking in transparency issues and negligent in their healthcare provisions. The social media can help swing this attitude for the better. One of the influences that the social media has had in people’s attitudes is that it has changed people’s perception of healthcare institutions as not being sensitive to patient’s complaints (CSC, 2012). Organizations that have tracked their mentions in the social media and addressed clients’ complaints have been able to enhance their reputation and those of others in the health industry. The mere act of replying to the customers’ complaints is enough to show patients that their interests are being taken care of (Andersen and Soderqvist, 2012). The instant replies have also empowered the public as they are able to make informed choices. They can have information about a treatment program at a far off country and make appropriate plans to access it. The social media and the internet have made healthcare services more accessible. Responding to clients’ sentiments in an informal setting has also helped change people’s perception about their value with regards to healthcare practitioners (Park, Rodgers and Stemmle, 2011). It gives them the idea that they are extremely valuable if an organization can set some time aside to respond to their comments or complaints. The perceived social support and interactivity is, thus, enhanced. This also rings true in instances where an organization is keeping tabs on the patent’s progress and their clinical outcomes. The ability of people to generate their own content gives them the perception that they are real stakeholders in the development of healthcare solutions. While this perception and change of attitude may not be justified, it is true that health information is increasingly becoming user-centered. The attitude towards the credibility of the health information being disseminated is improving as more and more experts are setting up blogs and providing evidence-based information (CSC, 2012). In terms of knowledge, the people knowledge on health issues has increased exponentially. Health information can now be obtained across many social media platforms. Provided one has internet access he or she can access health information on virtually every conceivable topic (Etyan et al, 2011). There are also many health programs that have been rolled out online and make it possible to be copied and be implemented elsewhere. Consultation fees have decreased considerably as a result. Conclusion In conclusion, it is clear that the social media has completely revolutionized how people are accessing medical information and how they appreciate it. Accessing medical information is now much easier than it was before the advent of the internet and the social media. Information that is evidence-based, credible and reliable is accessible via the internet (NHS, 2012). The social media has also been widely applied in the healthcare sector to disseminate health information and foster collaboration. Through the social media, healthcare institutions have been able to market their brands and products, they have been able to mitigate the negative effects of crises on their reputation and have been able to monitor their patients. Individual healthcare practitioners have been able to educate their patients and the general public and collaborate with other researchers. The social media, therefore, has widespread tool and is not going anywhere anytime soon (Grajales et al, 2014). 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