Differences in Health-Related Social Media Usage by Organizations and Individuals

Introduction: Social media is used as a tool for both information providers and information consumers to disseminate and receive health information. There is a dearth of research that compares the differences between different types of health provider Twitter ® (Twitter, Inc., San Francisco, CA) posting styles, specifically regarding the ways in which they communicate health information with the public. This is particularly true for more localized studies that focus on small data sets. Methods: Our study seeks to help fill this gap through an exploration of emergent trends of social media use of small, but specific, stakeholders in Texas, in the United States. Results: A content analysis of health information providers' (individual, organizational, and governmental groups) Tweets based on digital, ethnographic, and grounded theory methods was performed to provide quantitative and qualitative findings in terms of purpose, sentiment, visual features, tone of the Tweets, and public engagement. Conclusions: The findings indicate how individual or organizational users differentially use their Twitter accounts and open up a discussion of what factors might influence effective communication with the public.