Social Media · Business in Turkey
Social media marketing for clinics in Istanbul
By Ekaterina Danberg · November 2026
A clinic in Istanbul can use social media mainly to inform: who you are, which specialties you accept patients for, and health-protective education. Turkey's November 2025 regulation bans advertising of health services, including testimonials, prices and campaigns. Licensed health tourism providers get a narrower route for foreign audiences. I haven't worked with a clinic, so this is my approach.
I live in Istanbul and I'm not a lawyer. I read the Regulation on Promotion and Information Activities in Health Services (Official Gazette No. 33075, November 12, 2025) and compared it with a law firm's summary. None of this is legal advice, and a Turkish healthcare lawyer should review any plan before you act on it. Open Instagram and you'll see plenty of content that doesn't match what follows. That tells you nothing about what a provincial commission will do with a complaint about yours.
What the regulation says
Article 5 bans overt and covert advertising of health services and allows promotion only within listed limits. It applies to health professionals, private health facilities and international health tourism intermediaries.
| Topic | Rule for a domestic account | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Patient thanks and reviews | Promotion based on thanks or satisfaction from patients or relatives is banned | Art. 5 |
| Prices and offers | No price, discount, campaign or promotion details; no incentives, raffles or gifts | Art. 5 |
| Steering | No referring people to a specific professional or facility; no claims of superiority | Art. 5 |
| Paid promotion | Sponsored promotion only in the first month after opening, or for new medical technologies the Ministry accepts | Art. 5(1)(j) |
| Patient images | Written or electronic consent; the patient can preview and withdraw at any time; consent can't be rewarded and refusal can't affect care | Art. 6, 7 |
| Before and after | Same conditions, dated, no editing; a warning that results vary from person to person | Art. 7 |
| Never shown | Images during procedures, intimate areas, paid or sponsored visuals | Art. 7 |
| Interaction | Comments, likes and reshares turned off on the visual posts Article 7 covers | Art. 7 |
Sanctions under Article 12 include administrative fines, referral to the Ministry of Trade, disciplinary steps for physicians, access blocking and data protection measures. Provincial commissions handle complaints and the authorities are told to monitor social media.
Three details an agency tends to miss
Someone at the clinic has to press publish
Article 7(i) reads: "Görsel içerikli paylaşımlar, sağlık tesisi veya ilgili sağlık meslek mensubunun kendisi tarafından yapılmak zorundadır." Visual posts must be made by the facility or the professional concerned, and someone else posting doesn't remove their responsibility. So I wouldn't hold your login and post for you. A workable split has me on strategy, scripts and shoot briefs, with a named person at the clinic publishing. Ask your lawyer how far Article 7 reaches, and whether a doctor talking to camera with no patient present counts as the kind of visual post it means. The summaries I've read tie the comment and like restrictions to patient images, and I'd want that confirmed in writing.
The agency doesn't shield you
The regulation says those who share non-compliant content are equally responsible. A May 2026 legal review of Advertising Board decisions says the Board reads a post as a whole, covering the image, headline, hashtags, directive wording and patient narrative together, and that outsourcing the content to an agency doesn't remove the practitioner's responsibility. A hashtag can turn an information post into an ad.
A signed consent form may not rescue a promotional post
In Decision 2023/787, the data protection board looked at a private hospital that filmed patients with rare conditions and posted the footage online for what it called awareness. Patients had signed consent forms. The board held that the consent didn't make the processing lawful, since the promotion was barred, and fined the hospital 250,000 lira. That case came before this regulation and the sector rules have moved since, so treat it as a warning about how the two regimes combine. Patient images are health data in Turkish law, and a marketing clause in the admission paperwork won't carry them. Legal 500's summary says consent has to be given on the Ministry's own form.
The health tourism route, and its limits
Article 8 gives facilities and intermediaries holding international health tourism authorization more room. Sponsored promotion, discounts, campaigns and documented patient stories become possible, with conditions:
- The content is aimed only at foreign markets, in languages other than Turkish.
- It runs on separate websites or social media accounts from your domestic ones.
- Turkey isn't chosen as a target audience. According to Legal 500's reading, automatic targeting has to be off, and a technical error that shows the ad inside Turkey counts as a violation.
- The HealthTürkiye logo appears.
- Patient stories have documented consent.
Without the authorization, none of this applies to you, however many foreign patients you treat. If you have it, then you're running two separate accounts with two separate rule sets, and the most likely way to make a mistake is reusing a clip from one on the other. I'd keep two folders and two publishing calendars and have them checked by different people.
What's left to film
More than you'd think. Article 4 describes health-protective information as content that supports people in increasing control over their own health. Basic promotion covers address, contact details, working hours, the specialties you accept patients for and staff professional and academic titles. Only the specialty title on the diploma may be used, so the bio needs checking as well.
| Clinic type | An idea I'd bring to your lawyer | What I'd keep out of it |
|---|---|---|
| Dental | When bleeding gums need a dentist, and how to brush without making it worse | Smile results, "implant" pricing, the clinic's name as the answer |
| Hair | Which kinds of hair loss a transplant can't help | Graft counts as an achievement, day-by-day patient photos on the domestic account |
| Eye | Why dry eye gets worse in winter and what screens do to it | "Glasses-free in ten minutes" |
| Aesthetic | How to check that the person injecting you is a physician | Any named procedure presented as an offer |
| Women's health | What to ask at a first gynecology appointment | Patient accounts, comparisons with other clinics |
The aesthetic line above has real demand behind it: the May 2026 review notes salons being found in breach for presenting botox and fillers as campaigns. An educational video on safety helps your patients and doesn't need to mention you at all, since viewers can see whose profile they're on.
The format suits the rules better than people expect. A physician, one clear question, 45 seconds, filmed in a room with no patients, and no sales sentence at the end. The clinic's name stays in the profile.
How I'd run it month to month
- Lawyer reviews the bio, highlights and the last 12 months of posts. Anything non-compliant comes down first.
- Medical director approves a list of 30 health questions, and a person is assigned to log the approval of each script.
- I'd write briefs and scripts, and the clinic films four to six videos in one block with the rooms cleared.
- A named employee publishes, and keeps consent forms and dated copies of every post in one folder.
- Monthly check against the regulation, because the 2023 version has already been replaced once.
That's a smaller role than most agencies would pitch, and it's the one I can defend. If it suits you, this is the account growth service.
What you can measure
Sales-style metrics don't translate well when the content can't sell. I'd watch saves and sends where those are available, profile visits, calls and WhatsApp messages at reception with a note of how they found you, and the share of questions at first consultation that a video had already answered. Whatever you see, don't respond by adding an offer to the next post.
FAQ
- Can a doctor use a personal account?
- Yes, within the same limits. A physician may share health-protective information and practice details, and the regulation doesn't exempt a personal account from its bans.
- Can we work with influencers?
- On a domestic account, a post where someone praises a treatment they received runs into the bans on testimonials and steering. I wouldn't do it. A health tourism account has more room under Article 8, and your lawyer should see the arrangement first.
- Are Google and Instagram ads allowed?
- Generally only in the first month after opening, or for new technologies the Ministry accepts, unless Article 8 applies. Organic search and unpaid profiles are allowed if the wording complies.