Social Media Use by Health Care Professionals and Trainees: A Scoping Review
Abstract
PURPOSE: To conduct a scoping review of the literature on social media use by health care professionals and trainees. METHOD: The authors searched MEDLINE, CENTRAL, ERIC, PubMed, CINAHL Plus Full Text, Academic Search Complete, Alt Health Watch, Health Source, Communication and Mass Media Complete, Web of Knowledge, and ProQuest for studies published between 2000 and 2012. They included those reporting primary research on social media use by health care professionals or trainees. Two reviewers screened studies for eligibility; one reviewer extracted data and a second verified a 10% sample. They analyzed data descriptively to determine which social media tools were used, by whom, for what purposes, and how they were evaluated. RESULTS: The authors included 96 studies in their review. Discussion forums were the most commonly studied tools (43/96; 44.8%). Researchers more often studied social media in educational than practice settings. Of common specialties, administration, critical appraisal, and research appeared most often (11/96; 11.5%), followed by public health (9/96; 9.4%). The objective of most tools was to facilitate communication (59/96; 61.5%) or improve knowledge (41/96; 42.7%). Thirteen studies evaluated effectiveness (13.5%), and 41 (42.7%) used a cross-sectional design. CONCLUSIONS: These findings provide a map of the current literature on social media use in health care, identify gaps in that literature, and provide direction for future research. Social media use is widespread, particularly in education settings. The versatility of these tools suggests their suitability for use in a wide range of professional activities. Studies of their effectiveness could inform future practice.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Cites
Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media
Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. (2010) · Business Horizons · doi:10.1016/j.bushor.2009.09.003 · Cited by 17,875 · see citing works
Medicine 2.0: Social Networking, Collaboration, Participation, Apomediation, and Openness
Eysenbach, G. (2008) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/jmir.1030 · Cited by 1,143 · see citing works
Effectiveness of strategies for informing, educating, and involving patients
Coulter, A., & Ellins, J. (2007) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj.39246.581169.80 · Cited by 1,128 · see citing works
Defining knowledge translation
Straus, S. E., Tetroe, J., & Graham, I. D. (2009) · Canadian Medical Association Journal · doi:10.1503/cmaj.081229 · Cited by 984 · see citing works
Hawn, C. (2009) · Health Affairs · doi:10.1377/hlthaff.28.2.361 · Cited by 821 · see citing works
Single data extraction generated more errors than double data extraction in systematic reviews
Buscemi, N., Hartling, L., Vandermeer, B., Tjosvold, L., & Klassen, T. P. (2006) · Journal of Clinical Epidemiology · doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2005.11.010 · Cited by 464 · see citing works
Self-citationSocial media use among patients and caregivers: a scoping review
Hamm, M. P., Chisholm, A., Shulhan, J., Milne, A., Scott, S. D., Given, L. M., & Hartling, L. (2013) · BMJ Open · doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2013-002819 · Cited by 348 · see citing works
Self-citationOnline professionalism and the mirror of social media.
Greysen, S. R., Kind, T., & Chretien, K. C. (2010) · Journal of General Internal Medicine · doi:10.1007/s11606-010-1447-1 · Cited by 323 · see citing works
Analysis of Cases of Harm Associated With Use of Health Information on the Internet
Crocco, A. (2002) · JAMA · doi:10.1001/jama.287.21.2869 · Cited by 275 · see citing works
Professionalism in the Digital Age
Mostaghimi, A., & Crotty, B. H. (2011) · Annals of Internal Medicine · doi:10.7326/0003-4819-154-8-201104190-00008 · Cited by 123 · see citing works
Social Media and the Health System
Eytan, T., Benabio, J., Golla, V., Parikh, R. K., & Stein, S. (2011) · The Permanente Journal · doi:10.7812/tpp/10-154 · Cited by 55 · see citing works
Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right: Harm Aggravated by Inaccurate Information on the Internet
Crocco, A., Villasís-Keever, M. Á., & Jadad, A. R. (2002) · PEDIATRICS · doi:10.1542/peds.109.3.522 · Cited by 53 · see citing works
The world wide web of research and access to knowledge
Meyer, E. T., & Schroeder, R. (2009) · Knowledge Management Research & Practice · doi:10.1057/kmrp.2009.13 · Cited by 45 · see citing works
Villagran, M. M. (2011) · Patient Education and Counseling · doi:10.1016/j.pec.2010.12.020 · Cited by 30 · see citing works
Paradigm Shift or Annoying Distraction
O’Donnell, J., Clayton, M., Anderson, P. F., Krueger, A. B., & Spallek, H. (2010) · Applied Clinical Informatics · doi:10.4338/aci-2010-01-cr-0003 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
Tweet, post, share—a new school of health communication
Morris, K. (2011) · The Lancet Infectious Diseases · doi:10.1016/s1473-3099(11)70159-1 · Cited by 21 · see citing works
Many social media options exist for optometrists
Bonilla-Warford, N. (2010) · Optometry · doi:10.1016/j.optm.2010.09.006 · Cited by 4 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Feedback for learners in medical education: What is known? A scoping review.
Bing-You, R., Hayes, V., Varaklis, K., Trowbridge, R., Kemp, H., & McKelvy, D. (2017) · Academic Medicine · doi:10.1097/acm.0000000000001578 · Cited by 256 · see citing works
Vukušić Rukavina, T., Viskić, J., Machala Poplašen, L., Relić, D., Marelić, M., Jokic, D., & Sedak, K. (2021) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/25770 · Cited by 199 · see citing works
“Social media have been defined as “a group of online applications that allow for the creation and exchange of content generated by users” [3] and can be categorized into five groups: (1) collaborative projects (eg, Wikipedia), (2) blogs or microblogs (eg, Blogger or Twitter), (3) content…”
Health Researchers’ Use of Social Media: Scoping Review
Dol, J., Tutelman, P. R., Chambers, C. T., Barwick, M., Drake, E. K., Parker, J. A., Parker, R., Benchimol, E. I., George, R. B., & Witteman, H. O. (2019) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/13687 · Cited by 80 · see citing works
Social media in professional medicine: new resident perceptions and practices
Lefebvre, C., Mesner, J., Stopyra, J., O'Neill, J., Husain, I., Geer, C., Gerancher, K., Atkinson, H., Harper, E., Huang, W., et al. (2016) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/jmir.5612 · Cited by 88 · see citing works
Nikiphorou, E., Studenic, P., Ammitzbøll, C. G., Canavan, M., Jani, M., Ospelt, C., & Berenbaum, F. (2017) · Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases · doi:10.1136/annrheumdis-2016-209718 · Cited by 61 · see citing works
Social Media and Medical Professionalism: Rethinking the Debate and the Way Forward
Fenwick, T. (2014) · Academic Medicine · doi:10.1097/acm.0000000000000436 · Cited by 34 · see citing works
Dawkins, R., King, W. D., Boateng, B., Nichols, M., & Desselle, B. C. (2017) · JMIR Medical Education · doi:10.2196/mededu.5993 · Cited by 17 · see citing works
“Recent reviews of social media use by physicians indicate widespread use in medical education [1] and for personal and professional purposes [2-4].”
BackgroundViskić, J., Marelić, M., Machala Poplašen, L., & Vukušić Rukavina, T. (2022) · BMC Medical Ethics · doi:10.1186/s12910-022-00870-0 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
“The most widely accepted definition of SM is “a group of online applications that allow for the creation and exchange of content generated by users” [4].”
BackgroundEvaluating the appropriateness of Facebook posts – What do faculty and residents consider?
Loo, M. E., Wong, B., & Lee, Y. M. (2020) · The Asia Pacific Scholar · doi:10.29060/taps.2020-5-3/oa2226 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
- Authors
- Hamm, M. P., Chisholm, A., Shulhan, J., Milne, A., Scott, S. D., Klassen, T. P., & Hartling, L.
- Affiliations
- University of Alberta (CA)
- Corresponding author
- Hamm, Michele P.
- Venue
- Academic Medicine
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2013-09
- Volume
- 88
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 1376-1383
- ISSN
- 1040-2446 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2079331652
- Semantic Scholar
- 3d6e2def1df4251dda02ac939fda58eb59d0227c
- Cited by
- 136
- References
- 17
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 11 · 2020: 14 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 18 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 13 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 2
- FWCI
- 13.28
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Academic Medicine (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Canadian Institutes of Health Research
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Health › Social Media in Health Education
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Educational Technology in Learning
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Innovations in Medical Education
- Keywords
- social media, healthcare workers, medical trainees, online forums, professional communication, medical education, health professions education, effectiveness evaluation, research utilization
- MeSH terms
- Health Personnel, Social Media
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
