[Influencer Marketing in Healthcare: A Review].

BACKGROUND Social media influencers play an important role in the (digital) life of millions of Germans. In the health sector, these protagonists and their channels are used not only with commercial intentions, but also increasingly for the communication of health messages. We want to investigate if influencers can play an important role in promoting health. We summarize the current scientific evidence on the use of influencer marketing in health communication. METHODS Selective literature search on PubMed with the search terms "Influencer marketing" and "health" and summary of the results. RESULTS We identified 173 publications, from which four fulfilled the inclusion criteria. For the classification of health influencers, we propose 5 categories. CONCLUSION So far, there is only weak evidence for health-promoting effects through the communication of influencers. Both in practice and in science, more knowledge about the health-promoting use of influencers needs to be gained.