Abstract
BackgroundIn recent decades, the literature on Social Network Analysis and health has experienced a significant increase. Disease transmission, health behavior, organizational networks, social capital, and social support are among the different health areas where Social Network Analysis has been applied. The current epidemiological trend is characterized by a progressive increase in the population’s ageing and the incidence of long-term conditions. Thus, it seems relevant to highlight the importance of social support and care systems to guarantee the coverage of health and social needs within the context of acute illness, chronic disease, and disability for patients and their carers. Thus, the main aim is to identify, categorize, summarize, synthesize, and map existing knowledge, literature, and evidence about the use of Social Network Analysis to study social support and care in the context of illness and disability.MethodsThis scoping review will be conducted following Arksey and O'Malley's framework with adaptations from Levac et al. and Joanna Briggs Institute’s methodological guidance for conducting scoping reviews. We will search the following databases (from January 2000 onwards): PubMed, MEDLINE, Web of Science Core Collection, SCOPUS, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, PROSPERO, and DARE. Complementary searches will be conducted in selected relevant journals. Only articles related to social support or care in patients or caregivers in the context of acute illnesses, disabilities or long-term conditions will be considered eligible for inclusion. Two reviewers will screen all the citations, full-text articles, and abstract the data independently. A narrative synthesis will be provided with information presented in the main text and tables.DiscussionThe knowledge about the scientific evidence available in the literature, the methodological characteristics of the studies identified based on Social Network Analysis, and its main contributions will highlight the importance of health-related research's social and relational dimensions. These results will shed light on the importance of the structure and composition of social networks to provide social support and care and their impact on other health outcomes. It is anticipated that results may guide future research on network-based interventions that might be considered drivers to provide further knowledge in social support and care from a relational approach at the individual and community levels.Trial registrationOpen Science Framework https://osf.io/dqkb5.
Highlights
In recent decades, the literature on Social Network Analysis and health has experienced a significant increase
Research based on Social Network Analysis (SNA) has been increasingly used in health, including areas such as disease transmission, health behavior, organizational networks, social capital, and social support [3,4,5]
Since there is no previous research that synthesizes the current knowledge on this research topic, we aim to identify, categorize, summarize, synthesize, and map existing knowledge, literature, and evidence about social network analysis to study social support and care in patients or caregivers in the context of illness, disability, or long-term conditions
Summary
The literature on Social Network Analysis and health has experienced a significant increase. Health behavior, organizational networks, social capital, and social support are among the different health areas where Social Network Analysis has been applied. Research based on SNA has been increasingly used in health, including areas such as disease transmission, health behavior, organizational networks, social capital, and social support [3,4,5]. The first empirical studies were published in the Annual Review of Public Health in the mid-1990s [6] They showed the usefulness of specific SNA techniques to evaluate prevention programs among the involved organizations [7], or the relationship between HIV status, drug use and sexual relations [8]. There has been an exponential increase in scientific publications based on this methodology, especially in the last decade
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