Social media and Health Care | Report

Running head: Nursing
Social media and health care
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Authors Note

1Social media and healthcare
Introduction
Social media is the most common modern electronic technology and through this
platform, the whole world is at the fingertips of the users. The fast and remote features of
social media will help people to access and share information with other people. Health
professionals also embrace social networking sites to advance their career progress by
making connections among people. The connections from social media will lead to
innovative and efficient job opportunities for them. Social media can be used in the
improvement of professional networking and education, promotion of organizations, patient
care, public health programs, and patient education. The role of social media is important
while communicating with the public or patients to improve healthcare facilities by collecting
feedbacks, sharing and spreading information. The potential risk about the use of social
media by health professionals is related to breach of privacy and confidentiality regarding the
patient's information and legal issues. Different social, political and ethical issues can be
observed due to the rapid usage of social media amongst the healthcare professionals. The
essay gives a brief description of the effect of social media in Healthcare with its risk and
benefits. The essay will also critically analyse the role of nursing staff to maintain national or
International guidelines during treatment in this age of social media.
Context
Different social media platform
Social media is constantly evolving and is the most used internet-based tool. This
platform will help to communicate via sharing information, creating ideas, sending personal
images and messages with other content. Using social media is also known as Web 2.0 or
social networking as it allows the users to get different data and to send them at a certain
point of time to several persons. With the help of social media platforms, nurses and other
healthcare workers can share their information (study materials, therapeutic suggestions for

2Social media and healthcare
patients, legal compliances for the wellbeing of patients and their families, healthcare-
oriented survey reports) via blogs, videos, and photos. There are several features available on
different social media platforms that can be used for various purposes by the users. For
example; platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Whatsapp are used for social
networking; platforms like LinkedIn, Monster.com, Recruit.net are considered for
professional networking; platform like YouTube is used for sharing videos on different issues
and photos also; knowledge information aggregator or Wikipedia is also considered as the
builder of a network in the society throughout the world and virtual reality or gaming
environment are mostly used entertainment-based networks.
Use of Social media in contemporary healthcare
An integrated literature review can be conducted to evaluate the rate of using social media
amongst the Healthcare professionals. The result of a study shows that emerging evidence
related to using social media among healthcare professionals for developing the virtual
communities that support professional networking, share information and deliver knowledge
on evidence-based practices (Rolls, Hansen, Jackson & Elliott, 2016).). It was conducted to
assess the popularity of online social media Urologists of Australia and New Zealand. The
result showed that 70% of participants have a prominent presence in their social media
account (Davies, Murphy, van Rij, Woo &Lawrentschuk, 2015). According to WHO, public
health professionals should also be aware of “Google insights” a web-based analytical tool
and analytical tips from social media users(www.who.int.,2020). WHO (World Health
Organisation) recognizes “Twitter” and other social media as a tool to share accurate data to
many people. Twitter provides instant streaming of information around the world. The users
can have information related to health conferences search for information and share web links
from their respective devices. World Health Organisation used Twitter during the H1 N1
pandemic (www.who.int. ,2020).

3Social media and healthcare
Professional guidelines for using Social media
Registered health practitioners of Australia have proper guidelines and code of ethics
regarding professional conduct to use social media. “Guidelines for advertising regulated
Health Services” has been set for confidentiality and privacy obligations, professional
conduct maintenance and to promote professional communication among the clients and
health professionals(www.ahpra.gov.au. ,2020). National registration and accreditation
scheme has the primary objective of using social media in Healthcare departments to increase
the facility and quality of the care. According to guidelines, every practitioner should use
their social media accounts with responsibility and accountability. They should not cross any
ethical and professional conduct while using social media. Patient confidentiality, cultural
awareness patient safety and patients ‘social and cultural believes should not be affected in
any circumstances. The code of conduct emphasizes on treating patients with respect and
communicate with them effectively (www.nursingmidwiferyboard.gov.au. ,2020). Therefore,
health professionals are bound to maintain the professional relationship and boundaries with
the patient. The guidelines also ensure that breaching of any professional conduct and actions
which do not follow the social media policy of Australia will lead to legal circumstances
against the health professional.
Risks
Political issues
Political disengagements are serious problems across the world. The disengagements
can result in a declining level of trust among the policymakers and policy users. In policy-
making and adoption of the policies, the users can express their disagreements through social
media and conflicts of interest might be occurred (Bou-Karroum et al., 2017). According to
different researches, patients with special health complications and family members of the
patient are forming digitally network groups that are becoming special interest lobby groups