By Delphine Houlton
Our Facebook Myelopathy Support group, founded by Iwan Sadler, now has more than 1,000 members worldwide.
A great success story which is set to grow as awareness of Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy (DCM) increases.
There is little doubt that social media is revolutionizing health care. A US study by Pricewaterhouse Cooper in 2012 showed that one third of US consumers use social space as a natural habitat for health discussions. Meanwhile a 2010 report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project showed one half of e-patients living with chronic diseases take advantage of user generated information.
Using this research and more, Pius Boachie writing for http://www.adweek.com/digital/ demonstrates the importance of Facebook groups for people with health issues sharing experiences, offering support and raising awareness and funds.
Social media has also given patients opportunities to vent their frustrations and anger as well as following up issues keeping healthcare providers on their toes.
But it is not just of benefit to the patients. Pius Boachie claims 88% of doctors use social media to research pharmaceutical, biotech and medical devices, and 60% of doctors say social media improves the quality of care delivered to patients.
However, at Myelopathy Support we are facing a challenge and one that not only Iwan has noticed. Our Facebook group has attracted many more women than men. In fact, 76.7% of Myelopathy Support members are women and just 23.2% men!
The specialists tell us that DCM does not discriminate between the sexes, so what is going on?
According to research by Statista, women have been leading the way on the major social media platforms, such as Facebook, for a long time but the gap is narrowing. Now the USA has 230 million Facebook users of which 52% are women and 48% are men.
So, men are aware of Facebook and interacting but there is a possibility they are using it differently. At least this is an argument presented in www.socialmediatoday.com in 2016.
The authors say research reveals men are more likely to use social media to seek information or new relationships while women use platforms such as Facebook to connect with people and nurture existing relationships.
Women are more likely to share personal issues while men prefer more abstract topics. On a more negative note, men were much more commonly trolling on social media or engaging in aggressive and even abusive language. In conclusion, they accept that men and women communicate differently.
This sort of argument can be compelling along the lines of the popular Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus theses. I’m not a huge fan not least because I favour nurture over nature and see most styles of communications as culturally constructed with culture very clearly an ongoing process – a verb and not a noun.
Irrespective of my preferences, we do face the challenge of attracting more men to join and to benefit from the information, support and expertise available at Myelopathy Support on Facebook.
Should we be doing more on YouTube (54% male users) who spend, on average, twice as much time as women do on the site per week? Should we signpost the vast amount of detailed information available at Myelopathy Support more clearly? Should we run an invite-a-man initiative or offer a prize to the 500th man to sign up?
All suggestions gratefully received! Email: info@myelopathy.org
Our Facebook Myelopathy Support group, founded by Iwan Sadler, now has more than 1,000 members worldwide.
A great success story which is set to grow as awareness of Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy (DCM) increases.
There is little doubt that social media is revolutionizing health care. A US study by Pricewaterhouse Cooper in 2012 showed that one third of US consumers use social space as a natural habitat for health discussions. Meanwhile a 2010 report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project showed one half of e-patients living with chronic diseases take advantage of user generated information.
Using this research and more, Pius Boachie writing for http://www.adweek.com/digital/ demonstrates the importance of Facebook groups for people with health issues sharing experiences, offering support and raising awareness and funds.
Social media has also given patients opportunities to vent their frustrations and anger as well as following up issues keeping healthcare providers on their toes.
But it is not just of benefit to the patients. Pius Boachie claims 88% of doctors use social media to research pharmaceutical, biotech and medical devices, and 60% of doctors say social media improves the quality of care delivered to patients.
However, at Myelopathy Support we are facing a challenge and one that not only Iwan has noticed. Our Facebook group has attracted many more women than men. In fact, 76.7% of Myelopathy Support members are women and just 23.2% men!
The specialists tell us that DCM does not discriminate between the sexes, so what is going on?
According to research by Statista, women have been leading the way on the major social media platforms, such as Facebook, for a long time but the gap is narrowing. Now the USA has 230 million Facebook users of which 52% are women and 48% are men.
So, men are aware of Facebook and interacting but there is a possibility they are using it differently. At least this is an argument presented in www.socialmediatoday.com in 2016.
The authors say research reveals men are more likely to use social media to seek information or new relationships while women use platforms such as Facebook to connect with people and nurture existing relationships.
Women are more likely to share personal issues while men prefer more abstract topics. On a more negative note, men were much more commonly trolling on social media or engaging in aggressive and even abusive language. In conclusion, they accept that men and women communicate differently.
This sort of argument can be compelling along the lines of the popular Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus theses. I’m not a huge fan not least because I favour nurture over nature and see most styles of communications as culturally constructed with culture very clearly an ongoing process – a verb and not a noun.
Irrespective of my preferences, we do face the challenge of attracting more men to join and to benefit from the information, support and expertise available at Myelopathy Support on Facebook.
Should we be doing more on YouTube (54% male users) who spend, on average, twice as much time as women do on the site per week? Should we signpost the vast amount of detailed information available at Myelopathy Support more clearly? Should we run an invite-a-man initiative or offer a prize to the 500th man to sign up?
All suggestions gratefully received! Email: info@myelopathy.org