Social Media Use For Medical Information Sharing Among Medical Officers In Nigeria: Implication For Librarianship
Year: 2021
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: The use of social networking in industry and academic has been recognised in the literature. However, there are dearth of literature on the extent to which medical officers in Nigeria are making use of the social media for disease diagnosis, treatment and follow-up. The current study therefore seeks to investigate the extent of use of social media among medical officers in Nigeria hospitals. The study adopted the survey research design. A total of 250 medical officers were randomly selected across the hospitals in Nigeria. Data for the study was collected via online google form which was sent to the social media and social networking site of the medical association of Nigeria. The data gathered was checked for validity and reliability and subsequently analyzed using relative importance index (RII) with the aid of the IBM statistical package for social science (SPSS) and Microsoft excel version 21. Findings from the study revealed that the overall RII of the use of social media is greater than the threshold of 0.5. In terms of relative importance, it shows that WhatsApp has the highest (RII = 0.86) indicating high preference and highest relative importance. With regards to benefits of social media use, majority of respondents agreed that social media helps in gaining new ideas, skills or techniques (RII = 0.88), this was closely followed by avoidance of situation that can expose someone in the contacting of COVID-19 (RII = 0.87). With regards to factors militating the use, the findings shows that personality/individualism (RII = 0.83) was ranked first among the factors, while lack of network availability (RII = 0.79) was ranked 2nd. The study concluded that it is essential that health organizations should incorporate social media in their medical communication strategies, to modernize the approaches currently in use with a view to significantly increase the likelihood of reaching different patients with diverse health conditions.
Source: Lincoln (University of Nebraska)
Language: English
Subfield: Health
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3205622700