Social Media And Healthcare Essay

4 ways social media encourages healthcare transparency

Next year Twitter will celebrate its tenth anniversary and Facebook its twelfth. These are just a couple of the countless social media platforms that allow millions of people to engage and share information on a daily basis. In its various forms, social media are web-based tools that allow quick and convenient communication between patients, the general community and healthcare providers. Social media also encourages transparency that allows for collaboration for better healthcare outcomes.

Trust and Transparency go hand in hand

There’s little doubt that social media plays a major role patient engagement. Patient-consumers tend to embrace social media for two main reasons, trust and community. There’s a comfort that comes from engaging with like-minded people who’ve dealt with similar health challenges. Plus, 76 percent of patients not only use technology to manage their health but think that it has the potential for improving their health. Physician review sites add to the transparency-trust discussion by providing a podium for patients to rate and comment on doctor performance and competency. Having this information on hand helps the general community by providing much needed patient feedback that in

These 21st century consumers are tech savvy and possess the ability to demand access to their individual health information. In a recent report by Accenture, more than half of U.S. patients want to access their Electronic Medical Records (EMR). Consumers also have the authority to shop elsewhere if their current provider wouldn’t grant them access their personal medical records. Savvy patient-consumers expect physicians to stay current on social media/technology engagement and those who wouldn’t are doing themselves and, worse yet, their patients a huge