Web 2.0 e Sistema Sanitario Italiano: analisi sull'utilizzo dei social media all'interno delle Aziende Sanitarie Locali

This project work wants to underline the current problems and the challenging process of the adoption of Social Media by Italian Local Health Authorities (ASL) and to highlight how Social Network Sites are modifying health communication and relations with citizens in Italy. In my work, after careful reading of the literature about the use of Social Media for health organizations, I carried out a research project to monitor the presence of Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube) directly managed by Italian health structures.In this research I have adopted the mix method technique, matching quantitative studies with qualitative studies, such as adoption rate, post content analysis and telephone interviews with ASL communication managers. In a first step, I mapped the presence of Local Health Authorities on the most popular Social Media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube); in a second step, I carry out a content analysis to describe the prevalent kinds of messages published in the official Facebook timelines; in the third step, I interviewed healthcare directors and communications managers for the purpose to investigate issues, fears, purposes, aims and outcomes about the use of these platforms. I found a great heterogeneity in the use of these media and the co-existence of several best practices in the use of Social Network Site for healthcare in some regions of the country.