Social media in health communication: A literature review of information quality

Afful-Dadzie, A (通讯作者),Univ Ghana, Business Sch, Dept Operat & Management Informat Syst, Box LG 78, Legon, Accra, Ghana.
2023-1
Background: Social media is used in health communication by individuals, health professionals, disease centres and other health regulatory bodies. However, varying degrees of information quality are churned out daily on social media. This review is concerned with the quality of Social Media Health Information (SMHI). Objective: The review sought to understand how SMHI quality issues have been framed and addressed in the literature. Health topics, users and social media platforms that have raised health information quality concerns are reviewed. The review also looked at the suitability of existing criteria and instruments used in evaluating SMHI and identified gaps for future research. Method: The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses and the forward chaining strategy were used in the document search. Data were sourced according to inclusion criteria from five academic databases, namely Scopus, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, PubMed and MEDLINE. Results: A total of 93 articles published between 2000 and 2019 were used in the review. The review revealed a worrying trend of health content and communication on social media, especially of cancer, dental care and diabetes information on YouTube. The review further discovered that the Journal of the American Medical Association, the DISCERN and the Health on the Net Foundation, which were designed before the advent of social media, continue to be used as quality evaluation instruments for SMHI, even though technical and user characteristics of social media differ from traditional portals such as websites. Conclusion: The study synthesises varied opinions on SMHI quality in the literature and recommends that future research proposes quality evaluation criteria and instruments specifically for SMHI.
HEALTH INFORMATION MANAGEMENT JOURNAL
卷号:52|期号:1|页码:3-17
ISSN:1833-3583|收录类别:SCIE
语种
英语
来源机构
University of Ghana
资助信息
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Scholarship (QES) at McGill and Carleton University, Canada.
被引频次(WOS)
5
被引频次(其他)
5
180天使用计数
23
2013以来使用计数
96
EISSN
1833-3575
出版年
2023-1
DOI
10.1177/1833358321992683
学科领域
循证公共卫生
关键词
consumer health information data quality e-health health communication misinformation review systematic quality indicators social media Social Media Health Information social media health communication online health information quality
资助机构
Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Scholarship (QES) at McGill Carleton University, Canada
WOS学科分类
Health Policy & Services Medical Informatics