24/11/2022 / Health and Fitness
Benefits of Social Media in Healthcare
Social media has become a one-stop platform for all healthcare services and information. Know their benefits and challenges.
Table of Content
Introduction
There is almost no one in this world who isn't holding at least one social media account. Living in a digital world made it almost impossible to survive without connecting with people in social circles. The importance of social media has also penetrated the healthcare system, offering several benefits. In this article, you would see the benefits and challenges when it comes to the role of social media in healthcare.
Importance of Social Media in Healthcare
After social media has become a part of our daily lives, it is no surprise that it plays a major role in the healthcare system. Social media offers several benefits to patients in this digital age. Though social media has several positive points, it has equal downsides.
Benefits of Social Media in Healthcare
Below are some of the major benefits offered by social media in healthcare,
Attracting Potential Employees
For recruitment in healthcare services, social media helps in creating a positive appeal and build trust with prospective employees.
Conducting Advanced Research Works
The world is getting updated every day so the need of having research communities on social media is very much needed. Social media helps in proper collaboration and communication for several health research scientists.
Marketing Brand and Unique Practices
Healthcare service providers are using social media platforms to promote and market their practices to new patients.
Promoting Health Information
Healthcare organizations are utilizing social media to promote messages about general health and wellness information.
Healthcare practitioners and medicine-pursuing students are using social media to network and communicate with their peers.
Studying Updated Medicinal Information
Both new trainees and experienced healthcare professionals are using social media to further their education in healthcare.
Treating Patients With Telemedicine
Many healthcare organizations nowadays use social media to provide telemedicine for treating patients, thereby expanding their reach and improving the convenience of obtaining healthcare.
Understanding Both the Benefits and Risks of Social Media in Healthcare
As we all know, social media is just a package of both positives and negatives. Though social media liberally benefits healthcare, it has certain drawbacks too. Know the benefits and risks of social media below,
Probability of Privacy Breach
Due to the greater risk of privacy breaches and data insecurity, you need to be extremely careful with the information that you are posting on social media platforms. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) has strict policies that dictate terms for protecting a patient’s personal information. So healthcare professionals need to be very careful about writing anything on any social media platform related to their patient's history or diagnosis.
Need Proper Guidance
Social media is an art that needs to be perfected with time. You need to be very careful in posting accurate, updated and relevant information on your social media platforms if you are aiming to get an online reputation or build a brand image. A single and insignificant mistake from your side can land you in trouble. So you need proper guidance to make you understand the nooks and corners of social media.
Opportunity for Patients to Praise Your Service
Social media in healthcare isn’t just about privacy or security risks. It also offers potential benefits and rewards. For example, you could receive an overwhelmingly positive response from your patient and it would brighten your day.
Great Way to Recruiting
Recruiting high-caliber and able employees is an important priority for every organization. Having quality practitioners translates to positive patient experiences and better names for healthcare centers. Social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook help in giving regular updates about vacancies and hiring efficient employees.
Boosting Reputation and Building Image
Being on online platforms helps health professionals in building trust and goodwill from patients. This helps in building your brand and boosts your reputation.
High Probability of Reputational Damage
Even though online platforms play a significant role in boosting your reputation, they can cause heavy damage to your brand image even when you make the slightest of mistakes.
Take-Home Points
Social media plays a major role in healthcare, especially in such a digital world.
It helps in boosting your reputation, provides opportunities for recruiting employees, collaborating with other healthcare experts, accessing data of patients and also offering telemedicine.
Though social media in healthcare has several benefits, it is a sensitive platform which has risks like data theft and privacy breach.
References
FAQ on Benefits of Social Media in Healthcare
Social media in health care helps patients to use Social Media sites to know general information about treatments, enables professionals to easily build relationships with patients, facilitates cost-effective marketing, and also aids in showcasing accomplishments and activities through Social Media Platforms.
Technology facilitates communication between healthcare providers, improves medication safety, boosts the efficiency of healthcare networks and promotes the quality of treatments.
Social media helps in increased subjective well-being, enhanced psychological well-being, and advanced self-management.
It provides healthcare professionals, especially primary healthcare providers like nurses with apps to share health information, debate health practice issues, collaborates for knowledge, and also communicate with the public to promote primary healthcare behaviours.
Digital technology in healthcare reduces inefficiencies, improves access, reduces costs, increases the quality of service, and makes medicine more personalized for patients.
Technology facilitates easy access to patients' records, gives in-depth knowledge about each patient's medical past and helps in designing personalized medication for every patient.
The Internet made communication between healthcare professionals and patients very easy and productive. Now, healthcare providers can stay in touch through email, smartphones, and text messaging rather than writing letters to patients reminding them of their appointments and tests.
Yes! Social media is a useful tool for communicating health and science-related concepts and nowadays they are widely used by healthcare providers to promote their work.
It's their highly sophisticated platforms that facilitate easy collaborating, sharing and communication of information related to general health and diseases.
Social media enables patients to provide, obtain and respond to content and information related to their health and past medical care.
Even though there are many positive sides to social media in healthcare like they provide information and help to help collaboration with various experts, they also have equally negative effects. For example, the wrong influencer can make people believe a quacky medicinal practice and also give false information related to established medical procedures.
The challenges that come along with social media are the presence of negative or ruthless reviews, the pain of managing regular content, the high probability of reputational damage, and the high time consumption.
The common technological devices used in healthcare are Automated IV Pumps, Portable Monitors, Smart Beds, Wearable Devices, Electronic Health Records, Centralized Command Centers, Telehealth and Apps.
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