Social Media Issues In Health Care Essay

Social media has become a big part in today’s society especially for the new millennium generation. As members of the healthcare field, a cautious approach to what is posted and what is said on social media is a big part of the job. Although nursing students have personal lives, they have to take into context of the restrictions and guidelines on becoming a part of the health care community. In the healthcare field, patient and nursing relationship must be strictly kept work related; however, sometimes this line is breached which creates problems like confidentiality. For example, when talking about work related problems on social media, caution is the best solution because any information could be related to a certain patient which would lead to a

Often times, these two clash and cause various problems in the nursing field which can lead to various consequences like being expelled from a nursing program or a confidentiality lawsuit. “It is recommended that schools have explicit policies regarding the use and misuse of electronic communications and social media and delineating the consequences for policy violations. Professional standards can be referenced to add credibility to these policies” (Westrick ). All policies should include exact guidleines that should be followed while being a member of the health care community. The policies should also express exact and possibly punishment for guildines being broken. A nursing educator should create case studies for studies to read to gain a perspective of what could happen if they were to break a policy. Along with policies for programs, personal policies and agreements should be established to determine the type of relationship between the patient and the nurse. All in all, social media and the health care community are an overlapping relationship that has to be taken into context at all