DiagnosisPR Speaks with Bertalan Meskó, Med Student and Medicine 2.0 Guru

September 29th, 2008

By Cheri

DiagnosisPR recently caught up with Bertalan (Berci) Meskó, a last-year medical student, studying to become a clinical geneticist with a specialization in personalized genomics.  While balancing his course work, he has also been recognized as a Medicine 2.0 expert with an award-winning blog, ScienceRoll.  Berci was kind enough to provide us with some insight into how the medical community is adopting social media tools and how they are changing the profession.

1. Where do you feel the medical community is in the adoption curve of social media tools?

This year is really rich in new sites and communities focusing on the needs of medical professionals. Some weeks ago, I came up with a compilation of scientific and medical social media tools and it seems I have to update that list from time to time as the number is still growing. Though I’m not sure physicians need that many tools and are ready to join communities that are relatively new as they don’t have too much time in their practice so they need tools that can facilitate their work, for example, by reviewing the literature and finding the essential publications for them. Such a tool is Biowizard.com.

2. How do you see your acceptance of these tools blending with your daily activities post graduation?

I cannot imagine my post-graduate daily activities without the tools of web 2.0. With RSS feed, I can keep myself up-to-date in my field of interest (personalized genetics) easily. By reading blog carnivals (such as Gene Genie), I’m sure I’ll know about all the important news and announcements of genetics. As I use medical community sites (e.g. Tiromed.com), it’s quite easy to find residency places or international collaborators for my research projects. And many more examples prove, at least for me, the real power of web 2.0.

3. How do you see this changing the profession?

It is changing the profession. The reason why is not because web 2.0 is a bubble or so over-hyped, but because being more up-to-date than your colleagues, making more new contacts or being able to find collaborators more easily is a career advantage. And I must mention the role of e-patients who are really about to change healthcare and medicine. They have expectations (to communicate with their doctors on-line, to find information about their medical conditions on-line or find relevant information that can represent the practices of their doctors properly) physicians of the 21st century must meet.

4. It has been widely noted the discrepancies in how physicians are using email in interactions with patients.  What are your views on this topic?

Using e-mail in physician-patient interaction can be a great communication channel. But it must be used wisely with a secure service. According to a recent study (E-mail Communication Between Physicians and Patients conducted by Mount Sinai Hospital), 50,49% of e-mails a physician (specialized in breast surgery) received were focusing on general information about breast cancer. That kind of information could be accessed through medically reliable, peer-reviewed websites. Moreover, doctors are often afraid of getting too many e-mails while this study pointed out that relatively few patients chose this way of communication although it was available to them. And last but not least, answers can be given in an organized fashion.

To sum it up, if a doctor uses a secure e-mail service and knows which reliable websites to offer to patients, e-mail can be a perfect tool that can save time and effort for both physicians and patients.

5. How do you (and other up-and-coming medical minds that are actively engaged in social media) prefer that people get in touch with you?

I receive many e-mails like that „Dear Sir, You should check this new service or product out and promote it. While I prefer getting letters like „Dear Berci, I know you’re writing about web 2.0’s role in medicine on your blog, ScienceRoll…” A few personal words can prove the writer of the e-mail spent some minutes with getting more information about that particular blogger. That means a lot to me. Maybe other bloggers have a totally different opinion.

6. Have you been taking part in any virtual learning experiences during your studies?  How have these technologies progressed in the past few years?

I’ve been an organizer of several medical and scientific events for one and a half years now as the virtual world of Second Life provides medical educators and students with numerous educational opportunities. There are regular presentations about important medical issues; simulations and exercises organized weekly at the Ann Myers Medical Center; physicians and medical students can listen to cardiac murmurs and can visualize the proper stethoscope position on a virtual patient at the Heart Murmur Sim. On the Genomics Island, students get a comprehensive introduction to the education of medical genomics. On the island of Nature.com, scientific sessions are being organized for famous science bloggers and mentors.

Major organizations (Red Cross, CDC, NHS London) have already established their virtual presence in Second Life, and I’m sure, there are many more to come.

To learn more, visit DiagnosisPR’s sister blog RaceTalk, where Berci has answered some more questions about Medicine 2.0, healthcare communities in Web 2.0 and the medical education evolution community.

Entry Filed under: Health 2.0, Media, Physician Practice, Social Media