Paper Info
Title
The Prevalence of Internet and Social Media Based Medication Information Seeking Behavior in Saudi Arabia.
Abstract
The internet has become an important resource to help people search for online medication information. This study aims to report the prevalence and profile of Saudi online medication seeking behavior. Conducted via a web-based survey with Twitter participants between January-February, 2015, the primary outcome measures were the self-reported rates of using the internet to search for medication related information. A valid sample of 4847 participants was collected over the period of the study. Out of the total participants, 68.3% (n=3311) were found to seek online medication related information frequently. Most of the social media users were female 83.5% (n=2766). The majority of respondents 63.6% (n=3081) used Google, followed by Twitter 28.7% (n=1392), Snapchat 21%, (n=1019), WhatsApp 13.8% (n=670), Instagram 11.4%, (n=553), and Facebook 5.5 % (n=267), with few searching YouTube 1.3% (n=65) to access online medication information. Findings indicate that the Saudi population actively uses the internet and social media to obtain medication information. Further studies are needed to explore the influence of the internet and social media on user perception, attitude, and behavior with the use of online medication information.
Year
DOI
Venue
2016
10.3233/978-1-61499-664-4-275
Studies in Health Technology and Informatics
Keywords
Field
DocType
seeking medication information,social media,drug information
Population,Social media,Information seeking behavior,Family medicine,Knowledge management,Psychiatry,Perception,Medicine,Cross-sectional study,The Internet
Conference
Volume
ISSN
Citations 
226
0926-9630
0
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.34
0
6
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Salwa Bahkali134.22
Suha Alfurih200.34
Maha Aldremly300.34
Ma'an Alzayyat400.34
k alsurimi513.68
Mowafa S. Househ611631.32