Applying Social Network Analysis to Understand the Knowledge Sharing Behaviour of Practitioners in a Clinical Online Discussion Forum

Abstract

BackgroundKnowledge Translation (KT) plays a vital role in the modern health care community, facilitating the incorporation of new evidence into practice. Web 2.0 tools provide a useful mechanism for establishing an online KT environment in which health practitioners share their practice-related knowledge and experiences with an online community of practice. We have implemented a Web 2.0 based KT environment—an online discussion forum—for pediatric pain practitioners across seven different hospitals in Thailand. The online discussion forum enabled the pediatric pain practitioners to share and translate their experiential knowledge to help improve the management of pediatric pain in hospitals.ObjectiveThe goal of this research is to investigate the knowledge sharing dynamics of a community of practice through an online discussion forum. We evaluated the communication patterns of the community members using statistical and social network analysis methods in order to better understand how the online community engages to share experiential knowledge.MethodsStatistical analyses and visualizations provide a broad overview of the communication patterns within the discussion forum. Social network analysis provides the tools to delve deeper into the social network, identifying the most active members of the community, reporting the overall health of the social network, isolating the potential core members of the social network, and exploring the inter-group relationships that exist across institutions and professions.ResultsThe statistical analyses revealed a network dominated by a single institution and a single profession, and found a varied relationship between reading and posting content to the discussion forum. The social network analysis discovered a healthy network with strong communication patterns, while identifying which users are at the center of the community in terms of facilitating communication. The group-level analysis suggests that there is strong interprofessional and interregional communication, but a dearth of non-nurse participants has been identified as a shortcoming.ConclusionsThe results of the analysis suggest that the discussion forum is active and healthy, and that, though few, the interprofessional and interinstitutional ties are strong.

Appropriation of social media for fostering effective tacit knowledge sharing: developing conceptual model

“…Social media platforms are defined as a set of internet based tools that facilitate the creation and exchange of user generated content These platforms consist of blogs, video-sharing sites, micro-blogs, forums, websites and wikis that are developed based on the concepts of Web 2.0 The digitization of healthcare is addressed by Stewart et al [8] who also examined the opportunities for IS research in the context of the healthcare industry. The researchers highlighted non-traditional areas such as the appropriation of social media by physicians, with a provision of opportunities for IS experts in this area through the creation of physician-centered virtual communities The study also indicated that another potential research area for IS experts lies in issues related to the adoption and use of social media [16,17,60].…”

“…Another research conducted in Quebec, Canada indicated that female health professionals viewed Web 2.0 as a useful mechanism for transferring knowledge, but they also noted lack of time and technological skills as a significant limitation for them [18]. A social network analysis investigating the knowledge-sharing behavior among practitioners in an online clinical forum discovered that despite their limited number, the practitioners' inter-professional and inter-institutional links are strong [8]. Gormley [19] attempted to manage knowledge resources through the offering of a social media-based knowledge-sharing opportunity in the form of virtual communities of practice (VCoPs) to employees who are involved in strategic areas of the healthcare sector and its delivery.…”

Effects of Individuals' Motivations on Communications in Online Health Forums

“…For implementation, we used the ERGM package in R version 3.1 because it allows for much more flexibility than other versions do in multidimensional network analysis (Stewart & Abidi, 2012).…”

Social network analysis in student online discussion forums

“…Application of SNA techniques have also been performed in other areas such as a Clinical Online Discussion Forum [8]. This paper investigates the knowledge sharing dynamics of professionals through the online discussion forum.…”