Social Media's Impact on Health Information: What Can Nurses Do?

Nurses are in a prime position to use their voices on social media to educate and guide the public properly. Nurses General Nursing Article

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Social Media's Impact on Health Information: What Can Nurses Do?

Social Media

Social Media has shifted the way health-related information is created and consumed. This shift has many advantages in educating and reaching a broad audience. Freedom of speech and the age of social media has produced quite the contrast between well-researched data and misinformation. Unfortunately, with so many potential resources available to the public, valid and trustworthy information can become lost. Nurses can use their expertise to share accurate health information via social media. 

Information Overload

The general population lacks access to high-quality, evidence-based research broken down into easily digestible terms. When confronted with a new diagnosis, most patients will reach for their smartphone or tablet and perform a quick Google search. The information they receive is abundant and can either be a current well-researched data-driven article or misinformed bias. For example, a simple Google search for "diabetes" netted about 4,090,000,000 results in 0.71 seconds, an overwhelming number of results. Yet, the average person will click on the first few and consider this their "research,” not realizing the information could be outdated, inaccurate, or irrelevant. 

The Infodemic

Social media includes well-known sites such as facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, and Wiki. It also includes blogs, micro-blogs, websites, podcasts, eBooks, smartphone apps, videos, and video games. Health misinformation (false information) and disinformation (incorrect information intended to deceive) spread rapidly among these various sites and can lead to public hysteria. Ultimately, this can result in poor patient outcomes. The issue has become so prevalent that it was declared a public health threat by the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations (UN), and the Office of the Surgeon General of the United States (OSG)1. During the Covid-19 Pandemic, the term Infodemic, though not new, was used to describe the spread of false and potentially harmful disease and vaccine information2. 

Nurses Voice

Current, reliable, easy-to-understand health information is needed across all platforms. Nurses were voted the most trustworthy profession for 20 consecutive years through Gallup's Most Honest and Ethical Professions Poll3, evidence that they are trusted. As a result, nurses are in a prime position to use their voices on social media to educate and guide the public properly. While much help is needed to combat the spread of false health information, nurses have the opportunity to use their presence on social media to provide up-to-date, accurate information. Further, they can use social media to remain current in their practice. Their combined efforts can work to promote positive health outcomes. 

Nurses as Educators

Through social media, the nurse can expand their reach and promote positive health outcomes by:

  • Alerting the public to concerning trends
  • Provide links to supporting research on topics of discussion
  • Encouraging the public to maintain a critical mind when seeking online health information, as what they find may not be accurate
  • Discouraging the public from self-diagnosing 
  • Directing people to available resources 
  • Encouraging the use of free community health hotlines run by medical professionals
  • Educating the public to be cautious of the promise of quick-fix products 
  • #Hashtag important topics 

Nurses as Students

Nurses can advance their practice by using social media to:

  • Initiate or participate in online groups
  • Network professionally
  • Share information
  • Continue their education
  • Stay up to date with healthcare trends
  • Seek out resources to keep up with trending media methods

Nurses should consider health literacy and avoid speaking to their audience using technical jargon. They should be cautious and abide by best practices to prevent HIPAA breaches. Further, they should refrain from providing diagnosis and treatment recommendations outside the nursing scope. Instead, nurses should direct people to seek advice from their primary care providers in these instances.

Conclusion

In this digital age, information can instantly spread across the globe. Unfortunately, this includes misinformation regarding essential health topics. Much is needed to combat the mistruths present. With so many passionate and opinionated individuals, nurses may be apprehensive about attempting to dispel false information for fear of being publicly attacked. Nurses can, however, proactively use social media to build trust with their patients and the public by providing meaningful, accurate, and current health information. Further, they can advance their practice by continuing to seek out opportunities to learn and grow. Collectively, we can confront the evolving Infodemic, all in the name of positive patient outcomes. 

How do you feel about personally using social media to educate the public? Would you feel comfortable correcting false health information knowing heated debates can occur?

References/Resources

1Confronting Health Misinformation: The U.S. Surgeon General's Advisory on Building a Healthy Information Environment

2Infodemic: World Health Organization (WHO)

3Military Brass, Judges Among Professions at New Image Lows: GALLUP

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Tonya Lynn RN

About Tonya Lynn RN, BSN

Tonya Lynn, BSN RN, is a mother, second-career registered nurse, and third-career health content writer. She lives off coffee and loves all things nature except snakes. She spends her downtime hiking, running, kayaking, paddling, and visiting local breweries, distilleries, wineries, and coffee houses with her supportive significant other.

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Specializes in Med-Surg, Trauma, Ortho, Neuro, Cardiac.

I used to be an advocate for accurate health care information on my social media.  Covid ruined that for me and I quit.  You don't want a vaccine, fine.  You want to take Ivermectin for your covid, fine.  You think covid is a hoax, fine.  

You think cheese wrapped in bacon is healthy because it's no carb.  Fine with me.  You want to eat a high saturated fat keto diet to lose weight and help with your diabetes.  Fine.  Have at it.  

You don't trust a licensed MD but trust someone with essential oils.  Have at it.


I'm done.

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Specializes in Cardiac, MedSurg/Tele, Mental Health, ER, Infusion.

You are right. There are some who will never get it, despite themselves! I believe it’s much easier to spread accurate information than to engage in the heated debates that ensue when attempting to correct mis/disinformation. Thank you for doing your part!

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Specializes in Dialysis.
2 minutes ago, Tweety said:

I used to be an advocate for accurate health care information on my social media.  Covid ruined that for me and I quit.  You don't want a vaccine, fine.  You want to take Ivermectin for your covid, fine.  You think covid is a hoax, fine.  

You think cheese wrapped in bacon is healthy because it's no carb.  Fine with me.  You want to eat a high saturated fat keto diet to lose weight and help with your diabetes.  Fine.  Have at it.  

You don't trust a licensed MD but trust someone with essential oils.  Have at it.


I'm done.

I work with a recent NP grad (she's credentialed but can't find a million dollar job in the flooded market in our area-shocker) that continuously advertises keto. When she found out I am T1D, she started commanding that I do this diet. I told her that, after conversation with my MD, I had tried it once, and my cholesterol labs were horrific, MD stated to stop, I was a heart attack waiting to happen! NP told me that I must have done the diet wrong, it's perfect for everyone ?

 

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Specializes in Cardiac, MedSurg/Tele, Mental Health, ER, Infusion.

Unbelievable! There is no one size fits all. Even providers, new or experienced, should keep an open and discerning mind when it comes to making treatment recommendations. 

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Specializes in LTC & Teaching.

I have been posting comments after various news articles and videos pertaining to COVID 19 since the Pandemic began.  For the most part, it has been a complete waste of time.

The level of toxicity that is out there is mind blowing.  It doesn't help when many public officials refuse to take COVID 19 seriously either.  How many times have various public officials been caught violating their own public health measures?

At the end of March 2020, I sent a lengthy detailed email to every minister of health across Canada, as well as our federal health minister.  The email was based on my 15 plus years working in LTC and working through numerous different respiratory outbreaks.  Not one of them, or any member of their staff replied.  Various emails were sent to different public officials during the course of the Pandemic and the majority of them were also not replied to. 

COVID 19 Public Health messaging (from my experience) has been a disaster.  I was just reviewing some news broadcasts from March 2020 here in Canada and the messaging was that face masks were not worth it.  So much for the precautionary principle. 

If we end up getting another large scale Pandemic that has a much higher mortality rate (such as 10% like SARS), we're really going to be in trouble. 

 

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Specializes in Dialysis.
17 hours ago, Tonya Lynn RN said:

Unbelievable! There is no one size fits all. Even providers, new or experienced, should keep an open and discerning mind when it comes to making treatment recommendations. 

I feel like this: once someone says "no thanks", drop it. I work in dialysis and patients get it from this lady, as well as a couple of vegans. The vegans tell the the patients (quite a few are T1D) that they can have candies, etc, just not meat products, it's a superior diet. Our medical director recently issued a memo that dietary advice may only be given per the dietician to avoid confusion, as well as fit the patient needs, desires, and ability to fit lifestyle. 

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).

"Discouraging the public from self-diagnosing" caught my eye.

One of the first things we do as nurses in teaching is to gain baseline knowledge. Baseline knowledge is a starting point, a point of reference, on which to create a greater understanding.

As had been said, people make up their own minds on what they will believe in and how they will take action. As nurses, we are carriers of information and part of our jobs is to relay that information in order to benefit the patient. It is the patient who makes a decision for themselves on their course of treatment. To believe otherwise is not accepting the reality of the situation.

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change."

Leading the horse to water is our job. It's up to the horse if it drinks the water and we will deal with the effects of dehydration, should the horse refuse to drink and come back to us for help.

Being a good water salesman in this case works much better than being good at forcing the water down the horse's throat. I learned early in my career that positively reinforcing someone's appropriate understanding of the facts will open them up to more understanding. From there, we can guide them- manipulate them if you will- to a consensual viewpoint.

We cannot turn a teaching process into a power struggle, and in the end, a lot of information we pass on to patients isn't empirically gained. We learned the information from various resources, accepted it as fact, and pass it on to others. It's all a matter of perception.

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Specializes in Dialysis.
19 hours ago, Davey Do said:

Leading the horse to water is our job. It's up to the horse if it drinks the water and we will deal with the effects of dehydration, should the horse refuse to drink and come back to us for help.

Or provide dialysis if their kidneys were in failure and they drank the whole lake.

Sorry, my weak attempt at humor on a Sunday morning... carry on

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).
1 hour ago, Hoosier_RN said:

Sorry, my weak attempt at humor on a Sunday morning... carry on

Oh Geeze, Hoosier, don't apologize- give yourself a pat on the back for your ability to make a learning process entertaining.

There are those who could use an abstract sense of humor in their dealings with others.

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, Transport, L&D, Hospice.
On 9/3/2022 at 8:18 AM, Davey Do said:

"Discouraging the public from self-diagnosing" caught my eye.

One of the first things we do as nurses in teaching is to gain baseline knowledge. Baseline knowledge is a starting point, a point of reference, on which to create a greater understanding.

As had been said, people make up their own minds on what they will believe in and how they will take action. As nurses, we are carriers of information and part of our jobs is to relay that information in order to benefit the patient. It is the patient who makes a decision for themselves on their course of treatment. To believe otherwise is not accepting the reality of the situation.

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change."

Leading the horse to water is our job. It's up to the horse if it drinks the water and we will deal with the effects of dehydration, should the horse refuse to drink and come back to us for help.

Being a good water salesman in this case works much better than being good at forcing the water down the horse's throat. I learned early in my career that positively reinforcing someone's appropriate understanding of the facts will open them up to more understanding. From there, we can guide them- manipulate them if you will- to a consensual viewpoint.

We cannot turn a teaching process into a power struggle, and in the end, a lot of information we pass on to patients isn't empirically gained. We learned the information from various resources, accepted it as fact, and pass it on to others. It's all a matter of perception.

Give me a example of the lots of information that we pass on which isn't empirically gained.  We depend upon the research and findings of scientists and other credible health professionals in peer reviewed publications as well as our own professional experience when we share information with patients. 

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).

Empirical knowledge is that information which is gained by direct observation.

For example, antipsychotics act as dopamine antagonists in order to abate the inappropriate behavior in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. This basically means that the excessive dopamine secreted by the presynaptic cleft in the neuron is not received by the receptor in the post synaptic cleft. The inappropriate behavior is decreased due to the interruption of the electrical chemical process in the brain.

This information was not learned empirically, it was learned through reading and discussion, and was accepted because it was logical.

Never having seen a neurotransmitter or synaptic cleft, the information is accepted purely on the basis that it makes sense and was not gained empirically.

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