Privacy Practices of Health Social Networking Sites: Implications for Privacy and Data Security in Online Cancer Communities

Design of a Mindfulness Virtual Community: A focus-group analysis

Mental illnesses are on the rise on campuses worldwide. There is a need for a scalable and economically sound innovation to address these mental health challenges. The aim of this study was to explore university students' needs and concerns in relation to an online mental health virtual community. Eight focus groups (N = 72, 55.6% female) were conducted with university students aged 18-47 (mean = 23.38, SD = 5.82) years. Participants were asked about their views in relation to online mental health platform. Three major themes and subthemes emerged: (1) perceived concerns: potential loss of personal encounter and relationships, fear of cyber bullying, engagement challenge, and privacy and distraction; (2) perceived advantages: anonymity and privacy, convenience and flexibility, filling a gap, and togetherness; and (3) desired features: user-centered design, practical trustworthy support, and online moderation. The analysis informed design features for a mindfulness virtual community.

Health Information Technology Trends in Social Media: Using Twitter Data

Objectives

This study analyzed the health technology trends and sentiments of users using Twitter data in an attempt to examine the public's opinions and identify their needs.

Methods

Twitter data related to health technology, from January 2010 to October 2016, were collected. An ontology related to health technology was developed. Frequently occurring keywords were analyzed and visualized with the word cloud technique. The keywords were then reclassified and analyzed using the developed ontology and sentiment dictionary. Python and the R program were used for crawling, natural language processing, and sentiment analysis.

Results

In the developed ontology, the keywords are divided into ‘health technology‘ and ‘health information‘. Under health technology, there are are six subcategories, namely, health technology, wearable technology, biotechnology, mobile health, medical technology, and telemedicine. Under health information, there are four subcategories, namely, health information, privacy, clinical informatics, and consumer health informatics. The number of tweets about health technology has consistently increased since 2010; the number of posts in 2014 was double that in 2010, which was about 150 thousand posts. Posts about mHealth accounted for the majority, and the dominant words were ‘care‘, ‘new‘, ‘mental‘, and ‘fitness‘. Sentiment analysis by subcategory showed that most of the posts in nearly all subcategories had a positive tone with a positive score.

Conclusions

Interests in mHealth have risen recently, and consequently, posts about mHealth were the most frequent. Examining social media users' responses to new health technology can be a useful method to understand the trends in rapidly evolving fields.

Is Connected Health Contributing to a Healthier Population?

Connected health tools, including mobile phones, incorporate various functions that capture events, direct actions, and make informed decisions based on complex sources of data. Connected health, a term recently proposed by some academics and industry, refers to the development, testing, and integration of smart technology tools into health care. Through these means, connected health creates interconnectivity across various environments, profoundly changing the way we learn, self-regulate, and communicate with one another. In health care, mobile phones enable more precise diagnostics, personalized health recommendations that enhance patient experiences and outcomes while containing health care costs. However, for connected health to achieve its full potential, issues must be addressed pertaining to active engagement in use, privacy, security, and quality, as well as the development of evidence-based guidelines. This commentary discusses these key challenges and explores the promise of connected health, specifically eHealth and mHealth. Anchored within the context of cancer, the authors’ area of expertise, the ideas put forward can readily be applied to other health-related disciplines.