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Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Since the advent of the Internet, websites have become the nerve center of the digital ecosystems of media, companies and all kinds of institutions. Currently, the impact of the global coronavirus pandemic has placed healthcare issues at the center of social debate, including hospitals and their web...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Tejedor, Santiago, Pérez-Escoda, Ana, Ventín, Augusto, Tusa, Fernanda, Martínez, Fátima
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7729626/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33297543
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17239145
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author Tejedor, Santiago
Pérez-Escoda, Ana
Ventín, Augusto
Tusa, Fernanda
Martínez, Fátima
author_facet Tejedor, Santiago
Pérez-Escoda, Ana
Ventín, Augusto
Tusa, Fernanda
Martínez, Fátima
author_sort Tejedor, Santiago
collection PubMed
description Since the advent of the Internet, websites have become the nerve center of the digital ecosystems of media, companies and all kinds of institutions. Currently, the impact of the global coronavirus pandemic has placed healthcare issues at the center of social debate, including hospitals and their websites as digital sources of trustworthy information. COVID-19 has intensified the need for quality information and the legitimacy of sources fighting the infodemic situation. In this regard hospitals become essential social actors in the spread of healthcare information. Within this framework, a qualitative study is presented with descriptive components and based on content analysis. This study examines 58 websites from the best hospitals included in the “América Economía” ranking health sector from Latin America. The study applies an analysis methodology based on previous research focusing on specialized web studies, defining an analysis model on six variables and 65 thematic indicators. The research concludes that hospitals occupying first positions in the medical services directory are not necessarily those that have the best websites. Similarly, it is worth noting that a quarter of the studied sample do not devote a specific space to reporting coronavirus information. Brazil, Colombia and Chile are the countries with the highest number of hospitals among those with the best websites. In conclusion, digital media, specifically websites, could constitute legitime resources of healthcare information consumption, so their accuracy and proper development seem to be significant to become genuine sources that not only could provide better healthcare services but help avoid the spread of misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic.
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spelling pubmed-77296262020-12-12 Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic Tejedor, Santiago Pérez-Escoda, Ana Ventín, Augusto Tusa, Fernanda Martínez, Fátima Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Since the advent of the Internet, websites have become the nerve center of the digital ecosystems of media, companies and all kinds of institutions. Currently, the impact of the global coronavirus pandemic has placed healthcare issues at the center of social debate, including hospitals and their websites as digital sources of trustworthy information. COVID-19 has intensified the need for quality information and the legitimacy of sources fighting the infodemic situation. In this regard hospitals become essential social actors in the spread of healthcare information. Within this framework, a qualitative study is presented with descriptive components and based on content analysis. This study examines 58 websites from the best hospitals included in the “América Economía” ranking health sector from Latin America. The study applies an analysis methodology based on previous research focusing on specialized web studies, defining an analysis model on six variables and 65 thematic indicators. The research concludes that hospitals occupying first positions in the medical services directory are not necessarily those that have the best websites. Similarly, it is worth noting that a quarter of the studied sample do not devote a specific space to reporting coronavirus information. Brazil, Colombia and Chile are the countries with the highest number of hospitals among those with the best websites. In conclusion, digital media, specifically websites, could constitute legitime resources of healthcare information consumption, so their accuracy and proper development seem to be significant to become genuine sources that not only could provide better healthcare services but help avoid the spread of misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. MDPI 2020-12-07 2020-12 /pmc/articles/PMC7729626/ /pubmed/33297543 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17239145 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Tejedor, Santiago
Pérez-Escoda, Ana
Ventín, Augusto
Tusa, Fernanda
Martínez, Fátima
Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title_full Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title_fullStr Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title_full_unstemmed Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title_short Tracking Websites’ Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic
title_sort tracking websites’ digital communication strategies in latin american hospitals during the covid-19 pandemic
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7729626/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33297543
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17239145
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