Question
Abstract
Currently, social media is used as an enabler of information dissemination in different dimensions in the society. Through this, it is possible to collaborate and coordinate various activities that involve human life. One of such is the use of social media in the breast cancer awareness month in UAE. In the cancer management, oncologists, educators, and community leaders have adopted the use of social media to ensure that the populations are conversant with the need for early diagnosis and sourcing of the accurate medication. Hence, in this research, the role of social media in creating cancer awareness in UAE shall be evaluated in detail. Notably, through the application of different case studies in UAE, this study analysis will evaluate on the best practice in adopting social media to advance the awareness process. The challenges of the use of social media in creating awareness shall equally be assessed and solutions recommended as best practice.
Contents
4.1 Cancer Prevalence Increase. 7
4.2 Impacts of Collaborating for Promotion of Cancer Awareness. 7
4.3 The role of Social Media in Creation Cancer Awareness. 8
4.3.1 Social Media application for General health awareness. 8
4.4 Challenges of Social Media in Breast Cancer Awareness. 8
5.0 Research Aim and Questions. 9
1.0 Introduction
Currently, the social media has become a critical part of our daily lives. A responsible use of social media platforms is an efficient practice that enhances the improvement in communication and information sharing globally. According to Kaplan and Haenlein (2010), being on a social media platform such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or LinkedIn is essential as it facilitates consistent updates and awareness of different issues in the surrounding environment. To this end, social media has become a critical tool in healthcare in information sharing with far-reaching ramifications to the overall community. As Garcia et al. (2016) noted, the social media platforms can be employed during the health awareness months targeting to assist in raising awareness of the services delivered by a program. Additionally, the use of social media campaigns in the health awareness months is used in events promotion, joining broader national conversations and assisting in the enhancement of health improvement of all social media followers. For instance, in UAE a group of social media followers had organized a supercar rally in 7th April 2017 targeting to raise funds for cancer treatment in UAE (The National, 2017). This is perfect evidence that when social media is put to good use, it has a potential of eliciting tremendous implications to health awareness and control.
In UAE, social media has been used widely in health awareness campaigns. One of the most common health awareness campaigns that have immensely utilized the power of social media is the breast cancer health awareness (Garcia et al., 2016). Nevertheless, there lacks enough literature that identifies the effectiveness of the social media campaigns in mitigating or improving the health conditions in which they are set. In light of this, the outcomes of this research will be to demonstrate the effectiveness of social media platforms in promoting health breast cancer awareness in UAE. Additionally, the results from this study will offer an instrumental understanding of the processes in which the social media communities are founded. Ultimately, this will facilitate the optimal application of the social media in collaboration for promotion of breast cancer awareness.
2.0 Research Problem
Social media offers a platform where personal experiences, questions engagements and receiving direct feedback from individuals who have cancer. As Rotman et al. (2011) argued, through the social media platforms, it is possible to find support groups and caregivers sharing their experiences, the source of consolation and connecting people suffering from similar conditions. To this point, there are approximately 620 breast cancer groups on Facebook with an estimated 2 million members majority created to target patient/caregiver support. There is also an increasing trend where healthcare professionals are resulting in the use of social media tools to reach their patients through twitter and update them on the existing therapeutic advancements available for them, answering the disease-related questions and providing their members with advice and reminders. Nevertheless, the efficacy of the implication of these strategies is still unclear. Hence, majority of the stakeholders in the healthcare industry tend to use the social media without a clear plan with clear deliverables. Additionally, there have been cases where fake practitioners have posed in social media pretending to offer distinct forms of services and awareness. In an article at Gulf News, Melania Swan identified that multiple unrealistic ideals and stereotypes are in existence confusing people and portraying the wrong picture of health living, mitigation of breast cancer (Gulf News, 2017). Lastly, in UAE, the social media has often been used as a PR tool where different practitioners use it as a chance of broadcasting themselves. As noted by Thackeray et al. (2013) they have consistently used the social media platforms in announcing their milestones, initiatives and updating their audience on their management practices.
Based on the above analysis, it is appropriate to establish the best practice in the use of social media platforms. This will greatly have impacts in understanding the extent in which the social media sites can drive increased breast cancer awareness in UAE. Mainly, through identifying the best practice of mitigating the commonly identifiable challenges of using social media in healthcare awareness, the multiple approaches of health awareness will be established. These include education and provision of support, raising the needed funds and advocating.
3.0 Theoretical Framework
Figure 1: Theoretical Framework
Source: Summarized by the Study
In this research, the dependent variables include need for a change of the messages used in social media for awareness, challenges affecting the use of social media and creating awareness and prevention as the best practice. On the other hand, the dependent variables include the social media and breast cancer.
4.0 Literature Review
To appreciate the role of social media in cancer awareness process, it is ideal to consider three distinct realms of literature. They include cancer and cancer prevention, role of collaboration in ensuring development of efforts in promoting cancer awareness and evaluation of the extent in which the social media can be used in enhancing collaboration in different contexts.