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Investigating cardiovascular patients’ preferences and expectations regarding the use of social media in health education

Background: To reach more people in the community, health educators have considered employing social media alongside traditional health education methods. Aims: To understand the preferences and expectations of patients with cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) regarding the use of social media in health education. To assess the association between patients’ socio-demographics with their preferences and expectations about the use of social media in health education. Methods: This is a cross-sectional descriptive study, which included 135 subjects with an established diagnosis of CVDs. The subjects were met at three cardiac outpatient clinics and recruited through a convenience sampling technique. They were recruited if they were adults, oriented and diagnosed with the CVDs for at least six months. Results: Most subjects (50.3%) were interested in receiving health education through social media, and 74.8% of them felt that using social media in health education would improve the process and lead to better outcomes. Preference for social media was significantly related to younger age, higher education, lower income, watching health education programmes on television, positive family history of CVDs, and currently has a job. Furthermore, higher positive expectations regarding using social media in health education were significantly related to higher education, watching health education programmes on television, being single, and currently has a job. Conclusions: Subjects with CVDs are enthusiastic about health education through social media, believing that it will be good for educating them and providing them with the up-to-date information they need to live with their diseases. Findings of this study may positively contribute to the international efforts of improving health education through employing social media to improve accessibility to health education materials, and consequently decrease the burden of CVDs.