Corporate Research Group’s Weblog

Solid piece by Melanie Swan in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health on the emergence of social networking in healthcare, including a list of more than two dozen sites.  (Click here for PDF).  Social networking for healthcare is still in its infancy, and a key question is how will these sites integrate with other disease management offerings utilized by patients?  But the concept does appear to be growing.  For Patientslikeme.com, one of the most well-established sites, the revenue model is to charge payers and pharmaceutical companies for access to data generated by users of the various disease-specific communities.  No advertising is sold.  Is this a viable model?  We’ll be taking a close look at the market for social networking in healthcare and the business model in a future report (click here for summary).