Personal social networks and health: conceptual and clinical implications of their reciprocal impact

Abstract

Social networks affect positively or negatively a person's health, and a person's health affects, in turn, the network's availability. This article discusses this double dynamic, recommends the routine exploration of patients' social networks, and offers a mapping tool that allows detection of strengths and weaknesses of those processes so as to facilitate interventions that improve the social support's health-enhancing effect.