Introduction

The journal I chose for my review was “Cybersecurity and privacy issues for socially integrated mobile healthcare applications operating in a multi-cloud environment”. In essence, the article goes talks about social media, and how a social media modeled healthcare system could benefit the industry. While it has many potential positive effects, it has some negative effects, and glaring weaknesses as well, especially around cybersecurity, and the protection of vital healthcare information. In terms of a hypothesis, I would say they are arguing that the rise of a social media integrated healthcare model can benefit patients and providers alike, despite its apparent weaknesses.

Social Sciences

The article delves into social science topics involving psychology, sociology, and privacy. It states that a social media healthcare model could potentially revolutionize healthcare by allowing patients to educate each other, and forming a better connection between patients and providers. It even has the potential to lessen the stigmas around certain illnesses, both mental and physical, and allow providers to monitor their patients even outside of a healthcare facility. Thanks to Social Network Analysis (SNA), which is a technique that companies and researchers use to analyze different social media trends, it could also help healthcare providers measure the mental health and stability of patients overtime. While this does point to the potential of better-quality care overtime, another study provides no evidence on it.

The article mentions an archival study involving healthcare models in 22 US cities states indicating that while the social media model would improve access to healthcare overtime, it did not include evidence of better-quality care. The model could potentially influence people with mental health issues hesitant to seek treatment, as well as influencing those who lack trust in healthcare industries. While the studies and techniques point to clear positives, there are a few glaring weaknesses.

First of all, privacy of information would be an issue; how much of a patients healthcare information could be accessed, and by who. The article addresses this by proposes a strictly enforced permissions and role system in the proposed model. Certain roles, such as doctors, would only have access to certain commands, and information regarding their assigned patients, for example. In theory, this could help to set those concerns at ease, but what if those roles are abused? This leads to the most dangerous threat posed to the proposed model: the threat of it being hacked. Without proper security in place, a hacker could escalate their privileges and have access to thousands of patients medical records, live-vital readings and in theory, a remote dosage of medicine potentially inducing a deadly overdose. While the article provides some potential solutions, the threats exist nonetheless.

Conclusion

The article is multifaceted, but I believe it sufficiently delves into the sociological aspects of a social media healthcare model, but the cybersecurity aspects as well. While it has theoretical potential to improve quality of care, it has proven evidence of increased access to healthcare. It promotes and supports its hypothesis and its relativity to healthcare while addressing, and providing solutions to some threats against it, and skepticisms of it. I think it has a lot of potential, but it would needs huge cybersecurity protections in place to not only be trusted, but to be effective long-term.

Work(s) Cited:

Al-Muhtadi, J., Shahzad, B., Saleem, K., Jameel, W., & Orgun, M. A. (2019, June). Cybersecurity and privacy issues for socially … – sage journals. sagepub.com. Retrieved January 25, 2023, from https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1460458217706184