Social Media and Global Health
I am going to tell you a secret. I don't think social media is any kind of magic bullet for health. It's one more tool to communicate with people, but that's all it is. It's not going to revolutionize global health any more than the telephone did. (Unless you want to argue that the telephone did revolutionize global health, in which case have at it in the comments.)
The British study I cited a few days ago, about how most people can't find their organs, was actually designed because researchers thought that social media would have improved peoples' level of health knowledge. Instead, it found them to be just as confused as they were in the internet-free seventies. So there's a piece of solid evidence that social media is having no impact on the health knowledge of the general public.
There are exceptional projects using social media to improve health, particularly promoting healthy behaviors and helping patients with self care. Tu Diabetes is one good example; it's an active social community centering around management of diabetes. Patients Like Me is another. Patients with certain diseases can log and share the details of the symptoms and medication regimens. Members of Patients Like Me find it to be a valuable resource in discovering new treatments and tweaking their existing approaches. This page, discussing an ARV regimen, is an excellent example.
Those are niche examples. They both apply to educated patients with chronic, manageable diseases. We need more time to find ways to use social media in other situations. Maybe we'll find a revolutionary application, but I think we'll just have one more channel for trying to reach people.
COMMENTS (1)