As I’ve written about before on this blog, the web is starting to transform how we, as patients, obtain healthcare information. Recognizing this, healthcare companies have become much more aggressive in how they’re using the web, specifically social media, to disseminate information. Forbes recently reported on a creative way one organization chose to promote a pivotal study.
In the Forbes piece, reporter Rebecca Ruiz, explains how the Mayo Clinic out of Rochester, Minn used Twitter to tease an upcoming study on celiac disease. They followed the folks re-tweeting the news and chose a select few to share the findings with exclusively. What’s unique about this, is that Mayo didn’t give the results to traditional reporters. They gave them patients with celiac and offered them an embargo of the study, with free reign to blog about it. A privilege typically reserved for journalists.
The results were also distributed on Facebook and through this YouTube video.
This example from Mayo is likely to be the wave of the future. Undoubtedly, more and more healthcare organizations will begin using Facebook, Twitter and other emerging social media tools and communities to reach out directly to the people affected by the disease states and conditions for which they are providing education. It will be interesting to see how these interactions impact new and traditional media as well as the consumption of healthcare information.
The Forbes piece also includes a great slideshow that highlights the best resources on the web for obtaining healthcare info. Check it out here.
At this point, we’ve all heard of Twitter in the office, at the gym, and even on the movie set, but the latest Twitter scene is sure to surprise even the most avid tweeters. Good Morning America (GMA) recently revealed a trend toward tweeting from the OR – that’s right, hospitals across the country are embracing social networking as an ME tool, citing the value of Twitter in reaching a new generation of tech-savvy medical students and residents. According to GMA, more than 100 hospitals currently have Twitter accounts, and speculators agree that the number will increase significantly over the next several months as more physicians and hospitals strive to keep up with the Jones’.
For an industry historically known for its resistance to technology, this is a pretty big feat. Twitter only recently gained national attention, as well-known personalities like Oprah, Ashton Kutcher and Britney Spears announced their active presence on the site. As “average joe’s” tried to understand the benefits and inner workings of this uncharted territory, some of the most prestigious medical centers quickly recognized a valuable role for Twitter in their medical educational efforts, and incorporated the technology into their everyday practice.
Mayo Clinic, for example, prides itself on its position as one of the first centers to truly embrace social media, eventually hiring a full-time employee solely dedicated to social media. Mayo has even developed a “tweet camp,” designed to bring MDs and nurses up to speed on Twitter. And a physician with Aurora Healthcare just recently provided live updates via Twitter during a knee-replacement surgery, in hopes of both educating physicians on the technique and alleviating any patient fears on joint-replacement surgery.
Naturally, this unforeseen adoption begs the question – are hospitals truly using Twitter and other social networking sites for educational purposes, or is there at least a small element of brand marketing in that strategy? With a competitive marketplace out there, hospitals would be smart to leverage new technologies to help create stronger brand awareness and defined differentiators. But I do believe that at the end of the day, physicians are genuinely looking to better patient care and improve efficiencies, and Twitter is just one of the latest and greatest to help make that happen.
Yesterday the Daily Mail reported that the volume of online content, driven by social media, could have long-term damaging effects on the emotional development of young people’s brains. The author, Mary Helen Immordino-Yang, a researcher at the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California, said: “For some thoughts, especially moral decision-making about other people’s social and psychological situations, we need to allow for adequate time and reflection”. It seems the constant flow of real time information from Twitter, FriendFeed, and Facebook is too fast for people to process effectively. According to Mary Helen, this means that we’re never able to fully experience emotions about other people’s psychological states.
So, we’re able to sort through constant information streams incredibly quickly (a new skill in many respects), but we are not developing the deeper analytical skills needed for us to engage meaningfully. I guess the question is whether the good (broader social engagement, information flows and access to true communities of interest) balance the downside (rapid response ‘skimming’).That’s where the real debate should be.
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