Social Media Use for Health Information Dissemination to the Public: A Survey of Extent of Use, Age and Gender Influences Among Doctors in Cross River State, Nigeria

Abstract

Social media use by people from different walks of life is common place, and its adoption by health practitioners in healthcare is expanding globally. This cross-sectional survey study aimed to evaluate the utilization of social media among doctors for disseminating health information to the public, while investigating potential differences in use, based on age and sex of respondents. A total of 173 doctors, both male and female, were purposively sampled from 11 secondary and 1 tertiary hospitals in Cross River State, Nigeria. Data collection employed a close-ended, self-administered questionnaire, and analysis involved descriptive and inferential statistics including simple percentages, ANOVA, and independent t-tests, all done with the aid of SPSS version 20. Findings revealed a substantial use of social media by doctors for health information dissemination to the public. Moreover, statistical analysis indicated no significant difference in social media utilization for this purpose based on either age (F (3,170) = 0.072, p = 0.975) or sex (t (171) = -0.924, p = 0.357) of respondents. The study recommended that doctors and other health practitioners need to be encouraged to continue the use of social media for health information dissemination to enhance public health literacy. However, the study suggested that further research needs to be done to explore potential factors influencing social media usage among doctors, beyond demographic characteristics, to optimize information dissemination strategies.