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Subliminal social media posts10/7/2023 ![]() Therefore, this paper provides a systematic literature review of empirical studies on the effects of social media use by patients for health related reasons on patients and on their relationships with healthcare professionals. ![]() Hence, the review of these effects will contribute to a better understanding of potential benefits and challenges for both patients and healthcare professionals, but also other healthcare actors such as policy makers. It is important to identify these effects of social media for the healthcare system, as “a growing percentage of patients use social media for health-related reasons, so health professionals will have to reflect on the alleged beneficial effects and the potential harmful effects of social media use by patients in healthcare”. Use of social media by patients for health related reasons provides different effects, which can result in both benefits and challenges. Thus, many healthcare professionals fear that social media use by patients for health related purposes often spreads misinformation among patients. However, this may have led to two deaths and more than 12 admissions to hospital. For example, one misguided idea on Twitter urged Nigerians to drink excessive amounts of salt water to combat Ebola. Since everybody with access to social media can post “advice” on how to deal with a certain health condition, it is important to create reliable online communication channels to prevent health problems being exacerbated. It may also constitute a challenge within the healthcare system to both patients and healthcare professionals. However, social media use by patients does not only provide beneficial effects. In particular, it allows patients to receive support, and to complement offline information, which may lead to enhancing the empowerment of patients. In fact, social media may have effects on both patients, and on the wider healthcare system. Social media use by patients can also be an aid to healthcare professionals by providing a tool to strengthen the organization’s market position and stimulating conversation for brand building and improved service delivery. For example, it fosters their autonomy by complementing the information provided by healthcare professionals and by providing psychosocial support. Social media can serve as an aid to patients. Previous studies on social media use in healthcare identified different effects of social media use by patients for health related reasons within the healthcare system. Accordingly, our results framework and propositions can serve to guide future research, and they also have practical implications for healthcare providers and policy makers. In particular, it identifies types of use by patients as well as the effects of such use, which may differ between patients and doctors. Our review provides insights into the emerging utilization of social media in healthcare. Social media use by patients was found to affect the healthcare professional and patient relationship, by leading to more equal communication between the patient and healthcare professional, increased switching of doctors, harmonious relationships, and suboptimal interaction between the patient and healthcare professional. The types of use were found to lead to seven identified types of effects on patients, namely improved self-management and control, enhanced psychological well-being, and enhanced subjective well-being, diminished subjective well-being, addiction to social media, loss of privacy, and being targeted for promotion. From these articles six categories of patients’ use of social media were identified, namely: emotional, information, esteem, network support, social comparison and emotional expression. ![]() Initially, a total of 1,743 articles were identified from which 22 were included in the study. The papers we included met the following selection criteria: (1) published in a peer-reviewed journal, (2) written in English, (3) full text available to the researcher, (4) contain primary empirical data, (5) the users of social media are patients, (6) the effects of patients using social media are clearly stated, (7) satisfy established quality criteria. We conducted a systematic literature review on empirical research regarding the effects of social media use by patients for health related reasons. ![]() To reflect on the alleged beneficial and potentially harmful effects of social media use by patients, the aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the extant literature on the effects of social media use for health related reasons on patients and their relationship with healthcare professionals. Since the emergence of social media in 2004, a growing percentage of patients use this technology for health related reasons.
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