1. Why do people use social media for
health?
These days, everyone uses some form of social media
whether it is Twitter, Facebook or Youtube. People have
begun using social media in relation to health for many
reasons:
• It’s fast
• You can talk to many people at one time
• It’s free
• It’s easy
• They may be too embarrassed to ask a question of
someone they know
• You can get different opinions on various topics

2. How do people use social media for
health?
Social media has become an integral part of how
people seek information regarding health. Some of
the ways people use social media in relation to
health include:
• Checking symptoms online
• Finding support groups
• Asking for opinions of doctors, diets etc
• Look up things such as drug recalls
• Looking up diets and exercise

3. Checking symptoms online
The Internet and social media have made
looking up symptoms very easy. There are a
variety of ways to do it:
• Post a status on Facebook
• Ask your followers on Twitter
• Use a site such as http://www.webmd.com/
• Use photos on Google or videos on Youtube to
compare your symptoms to others

4. Positives and Negatives to checking
symptoms online
Positives include:
• Some people may be too embarrassed to go to a doctor
• It’s fast and free
• You can get multiple opinions
Negatives include:
• You may not be reading accurate information
• Symptoms alone may not be enough to diagnose the problem
• People can misdiagnose themselves

5. Finding support groups
• One of the best things about social media is that
you have access to a large group of people at any
given time
• There are always people available to talk to and it
is easy to find things such as support groups
where people can go to talk to others who are
suffering from the same problems
• Support groups for anything from cancer to
mental health to the loss of a loved one can be
found using social media

6. Finding support groups cont.
These groups allow people to:
• Gain experience
• Ask questions
• Talk to people who can relate to what others
are going through.
• Examples of social media support groups
include http://www.mdjunction.com/support-
groups and http://www.supportgroups.com/

7. Asking for opinions
Social media makes finding information and what is
best for you a lot easier by allowing you to talk to
people (including nurses and physicians) regarding:
• Diets
• Medications
• Questions
• Diseases/disorders
• Weight loss programs
• Doctors, nurses, hospitals

8. Health Canada
• A great, reliable online source for health
related issues is http://www.hc-
sc.gc.ca/home-accueil/sm-ms/index-eng.php
• They provide access to things like:
i. Healthy Canadians Pinterest account
ii. http://www.nationalantidrugstrategy.gc.ca/p
revention/youth-jeunes/
iii. A mobile app you can download to your
phone with information

9. Diets/exercise
• Social media can also be used to research the
latest diets and exercise.
• Youtube is often used to look up recipes
because you can follow along with the video
as you make the meal
• Youtube is also perfect for looking up exercise
because you can find videos on how to do
certain exercises as well as full workout videos

10. Diets/exercise cont.
• Another way people use social media for
diet/exercise is through mobile apps such as
MyFitnessPal.
• This is a site where people submit what they
eat through the day/ the exercise they do and
it helps them lose weight
• They are able to add other users as friends to
motivate them, discuss their weight loss and
work together towards their goals.

11. Future of healthcare using social
media
• From 2005-2009, participation in social media
more than quadrupled (Jones, S. 2009)
• At that rate, things can change quickly even
over the span of a few months

12. How are health care professionals
using social media?
Patients are not the only ones using social media for their
gain. Doctors and even whole hospitals are using it to
their advantage as well. Examples include:
• The Henry Ford Healthcare System in Detroit has
physicians using Twitter to interact with more than
1,900 people (The Change Foundation, 2011).
• Hospitals and clinics use it for marketing
• Education
• Communicating with other doctors
• Hiring future employees

13. Interesting facts on social media and
healthcare
• More than 40% of consumers say that information
found via social media affects the way they deal with
their health. (Mediabistro, n.d)
• 90% of respondents from 18 to 24 years of age said
they would trust medical information shared by others
on their social media networks. (Search Engine Watch,
2012)
• 41% of people said social media would affect their
choice of a specific doctor, hospital, or medical facility
(Demi & Cooper Advertising and DC Interactive Group,
2012)

14. Interesting facts on social media and
healthcare cont.
• The most accessed online resources for health
related information are: 56% searched WebMD,
31% on Wikipedia, 29% on health magazine
websites, 17% used Facebook, 15% used
YouTube, 13% used a blog or multiple blogs, 12%
used patient communities, 6% used Twitter and
27% used none of the above. (Mashable, n.d)
• 60% of doctors say social media improves the
quality of care delivered to patients. (Demi &
Cooper Advertising and DC Interactive Group,
2012)

15. Conclusion
• As you can see, social media is now used in
relation to health in a variety of ways for a
multitude of reasons
• Social media is changing all the time so who
knows how it will affect our healthcare in 5-10
years.