Social Media in Communicating Health Information: An Analysis of Facebook Groups Related to Hypertension

This flow diagram illustrates how hypertension-related Facebook groups were included in data extraction and analysis. A total of 318 Facebook groups were initially identified by searching for keywords “hypertension” (n = 146), “blood pressure” (n = 119), “high blood pressure” (n = 48), and “raised blood pressure” (n = 5). After removing 55 duplicate search results, a total of 263 Facebook groups remained valid for assessing eligibility. Of those 263 Facebook groups, 76 were excluded because their subject matter was not related to hypertension (n = 71), or their content was not in English (n = 5). A total of 187 Facebook groups were included finally in data extraction and analysis.

Figure. Process for including Facebook groups related to hypertension in analysis of Facebook groups related to hypertension.

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