Italian Social Marketing Association - Newsletter 226

I professionisti della salute sono consapevoli che l’adozione di strumenti mobili ottimizza i percorsi di cura e il loro controllo. La presenza di App sul mercato è sicuramente di stimolo, ma per passare dalle parole ai fatti è necessario che siano gli operatori sanitari stessi a prendere l’iniziativa.

Di App per la salute e App medicali (quelle App che funzionano come un dispositivo medico) si parla molto, ma sempre di qualcosa “che verrà”. Per una volta, proverei a rovesciare il punto di vista. Perché dovrebbe per forza “arrivare”, visto che si intravede un effetto saturazione nel mondo smartphone, e i giganti del settore dichiarano che le vendite non crescono più? Non è una moda che passerà? Qualche considerazione sul tema.

Background: Approximately 80% of research evidence relevant to clinical practice never reaches the clinicians delivering patient care. A key barrier for the translation of evidence into practice is the limited time and skills clinicians have to find and appraise emerging evidence. Social media may provide a bridge between health researchers and health service providers.

Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the efficacy of social media as an educational medium to effectively translate emerging research evidence into clinical practice.

The process of distilling and disseminating the best available evidence from research, context and experience, and using that evidence to inform and improve public health practice and policy.

Put simply, it means finding, using and sharing what works in public health.

STEPS in Evidence-Informed Public Health

Click on the diagram below for more information and helpful links to help you understand how to complete each step of the process. Find links to recommended methods and tools from our Registry that are applicable to each step.

Controversy over adverse effects of vaccines has reignited across the media recently. New studies also investigate the influence this information has on the decision to vaccinate .....................................

Pro-vaccine communications 'are ineffective'

A study in the journal Pediatrics assessed the effectiveness of vaccination messages. Political scientist Brendan Nyhan, PhD, tested four kinds of message on 1,759 Americans: "Autism correction" was a factual, scientific rebuttal of the claims that the MMR vaccine causes autism; "Disease risks" listed the risks of contracting measles, mumps or rubella; "Disease narrative" was a true story about a baby who contracted a very serious case of measles.

Because of the rising cost of treating illness coupled with the difficult economic environment, interest in health promotion is increasing worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health promotion as the process of enabling people to increase control over their health and its determinants (e.g. smoking, physical activity, diet), and thereby improve their health. This is usually addressed by activities aimed at promoting healthy behaviors and creating healthy policies and environments in order to affect large segments of the population.

The impact of these activities is enhanced if healthy public policy is adopted across all sectors of society, especially by governments, including in settings such as urban planning not typically seen as part of the health system.

In an earlier blog, I wrote about what health promotion is all about and what makes it distinct.  In a nutshell, health promotion is about key values (empowerment, control, choice) and approaches that enable individuals and communities to take greater control over the factors that influence their health.

Equating health promotion with trying to make populations healthier is broadly true, but how this is done is the key question.  Part of my frustration with the profession of health promotion is the obsession on individuals’ lifestyle – how they eat and exercise for instance – as though this is the answer to tackling complex problems like obesity, diabetes and hazardous alcohol consumption.  

In 2008, I was a fifth year medical student and had a simple idea. I thought curated social media resources should be available to patients and physicians for free. My sister helped me launch a company and development of Webicina started right away. For six years, I treated it like a startup but eventually realized,…