The Increasing Importance of Social Media in Healthcare

http://www.afiahealth.com/increasing-importance-social-media-healthcare/

This topic is fairly obvious to most of us, but it’s also astounding how sluggish the medical community is in embracing change.  Some stats were discussed, granted some of these are 2-3 years old)

·       Out of 5,724 hospitals in the country, only 1,501 are using a form of social media, which equates to approximately 26% (Jean, 2013)

·       Utilization of social media by hospitals increased from 79% in 2012 to 91% in 2013 (VHA, Inc., 2013)

·       81% of hospitals said service lines expressed an interest in participating in the hospital’s social media strategy (VHA, Inc., 2013)

·       Only 22% of hospitals are using social media for reporting quality & patient experience information (VHA, Inc., 2013)

·       72% of all internet users are active social media users (Bullas, 2014)

·       Baby boomers are jumping on the bandwagon with 43% using social media (Bullas, 2014)

Although this set of data was compiled on one healthcare IT consultant company, it still underscores the importance of the growing need and market for social media in medicine.