Physicians writing on KevinMD about being a physician in public: professional presence online, patient privacy, online reviews and reputation, medical misinformation, and how clinicians use social platforms to teach, advocate, and connect. KevinMD itself has been a case study in this since 2004.

Why social media is an imperative for disaster psychiatry

Social Media in Medicine
June 25, 2013

Hidden amongst all the intense media coverage surrounding Facebook’s IPO, there was a news item that was covered so briefly that if you blinked you may have missed it: Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, took a trip to Japan and during this visit told Japan’s Prime Minister that the terrible Tsunami that had struck the country in 2011 had inspired him to find ways that the social network could help people after …

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Why social media is an imperative for disaster psychiatry

Why doctors should be allowed to post anonymously online

Social Media in Medicine
June 22, 2013

The General Medical Council in Britain released new guidelines on social media for medicine. Essentially, if you are a doctor in the United Kingdom the GMC does not believe that you should be able to tweet/blog/post anonymously if you self-identify as a physician. The exact wording is as follows:

“If you identify yourself as a doctor in publicly accessible social media, you should also identify yourself by name. Any material written by …

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Why doctors should be allowed to post anonymously online

How Edward Snowden and PRISM affect health care social media

Social Media in Medicine
June 19, 2013

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Edward Snowden’s whistleblowing on the NSA’s PRISM program raises some interesting questions regarding social media in healthcare. I had a few physicians both inside and outside of the community I manage ask, “Is the government watching what I say about my clinical experiences?” The answer is of course “Not yet,” but the sentiment weighs heavier than the question, and the weeklong dip …

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How Edward Snowden and PRISM affect health care social media

Tracking cancer conversations online: The Social Oncology Project 2013

Social Media in Medicine
June 7, 2013

As some 30,000 doctors, patient advocates, healthcare companies and journalists descended on Chicago for ASCO, there was a great deal of anticipation about what new research would be presented, and what kind of conversation and controversy might arise as a result.

That anticipation, it turns out, requires some patience, filtering, and a really big net.  In fact, the amount of clinical data available in oncology has increased exponentially over the last …

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Tracking cancer conversations online: The Social Oncology Project 2013

Why this pediatrician is worried about Snapchat

Social Media in Medicine
June 5, 2013

We’ve all been hearing about the cool app Snapchat, which allows people to send pictures and videos that only last a few seconds before disappearing. Because of the disappearing thing, the worry that I keep reading about is that teens will use it for sexting, figuring that it’s no problem if they take sexy pictures or videos, because they won’t last.

Now I worry about sexting as much as anybody else …

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Why this pediatrician is worried about Snapchat

4 reasons why patients should blog

Social Media in Medicine
June 3, 2013

Social media has opened a whole new world for patients.  Now, information about disease is readily accessible and available to everyone.  Certainly, there are issues with reliability and accuracy of internet sources and this can create uneasiness and misunderstanding for both physician and patient.

However, the internet can also provide many new therapeutic possibilities.  In particular, online support groups, twitter chats and blogging can provide a positive outlet for patients suffering …

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4 reasons why patients should blog

Why you shouldn’t give medical advice on Twitter

Social Media in Medicine
May 31, 2013

A few weeks ago I was following an online discussion conducted by a widely followed health site.

During the discussion, they had a physician who was giving out wellness advice to users via Twitter.

That physician had one tweet in particular that terrified me.

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As the above screenshot shows, one tweet mentioned that when in doubt regarding …

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Why you shouldn’t give medical advice on Twitter

Blurring the lines of ethics when doctors use social media

Social Media in Medicine
May 28, 2013

The position paper from the American College of Physicians and the Federation of State Medical Boards, is a humbling reminder of the challenges that today’s physicians face when entering the online space.

Their recommendations for online medical professionalism, written by ethics committees for the two organizations, “provides recommendations about the influence of social media on the patient–physician relationship, the role of these media in public perception of physician behaviors, and strategies for physician–physician …

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Blurring the lines of ethics when doctors use social media

10 simple rules for doctors on social media

Social Media in Medicine
May 26, 2013

How should doctors behave online? This is a funny question, isn’t it?

Medical establishment loves rules and hierarchy. Social media does not. Social media levels the playing field of who gets to talk; it gives real caregivers a voice. That’s very cool.

This is just a guess, but I suspect there are many more acts left to play out in the healthcare social media play.

The American College of Physicians and the Federation …

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10 simple rules for doctors on social media

Why Groupon and other social coupons are unethical in healthcare

Social Media in Medicine
May 16, 2013

In addition to the possible legal pitfalls of advertising on Groupon-type websites, there are also ethical and practice management concerns to be weighed by healthcare practitioners before agreeing to such arrangements. Even with the recent announcement that companies such as Groupon and LivingSocial may be offering contracts to healthcare providers that take into consideration the prohibition against fee splitting, practitioners should nonetheless proceed with caution.

The concerns about social coupons in the healthcare context extend …

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Why Groupon and other social coupons are unethical in healthcare

How a blog was a potent weapon against a union’s corporate campaign

Social Media in Medicine
May 15, 2013

An excerpt from How a Blog Held Off the Most Powerful Union in America.

The long-term decline in private sector unions in America has been well documented. From almost 25 percent of the workforce in 1973, the rate of unionization has fallen to under 8 percent in 2005. Some unions, though, have been able to buck this trend, most notably the 2.1 million-member national Service Employees International …

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How a blog was a potent weapon against a union’s corporate campaign

7 downsides to participating in academic health care social media

Social Media in Medicine
May 9, 2013

I love social media so much that I give seminars on how academics should use it to advance their careers and fields of study.  Today I’m writing about what I hate about it to answer a question often posed to me by social media skeptics: what are the downsides to participating in social media?  At the risk of completely undermining my mission to encourage greater academic presence on social media, …

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7 downsides to participating in academic health care social media

Social media in China: Does it make me a better doctor?

Social Media in Medicine
May 8, 2013

This month I hit a milestone on my Sina Weibo microblog; I finally reached 10,000 fans. It took more than two years, and I suppose I could have sped it up by paying for fake zombie fans. However, I preferred to earn this honor with good old fashioned hard work. Ten thousand fans is a tiny amount compared to many Chinese microblogs, including several at my own hospital like our …

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Social media in China: Does it make me a better doctor?

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Twitter for the engaged patient: A curated stream of new evidence

Social Media in Medicine
May 7, 2013

Since 1992, I have advocated for all of us to have the information, support and guidance we need to act to improve our health and get the most from our health care. I believe – and there is considerable evidence to back me up – that we do better when we participate in our care to the extent we are able.

As someone who has been diagnosed with several different types …

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Twitter for the engaged patient: A curated stream of new evidence

How social media recharged this physician

Social Media in Medicine
May 1, 2013

In late fall of 2011, I was tired of medicine. While seeing patients was still enjoyable, I felt underappreciated in my employment and frustrated by the endless BS that I dealt with — new laws undermining the trust my patients place in me, increasing requirements from insurance companies for ordering tests or medications, more forms to sign, less time with patients, a cumbersome EHR to learn, more non-CME education requirements …

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How social media recharged this physician

How I engaged Quest Diagnostics on Twitter

Social Media in Medicine
April 15, 2013

It all started with my sending a tweet.

Actually, that’s not quite true. The way it really started was with my frail elderly patient calling me in mid-January, to tell me he thought he had a UTI. But that part of the story is not new and novel; I’ve often had patients contact me with similar concerns.

I did what I usually do: ordered a urinalysis (UA)  and urine culture (UCx). (I …

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How I engaged Quest Diagnostics on Twitter

Why doctors should use their real name on Twitter

Social Media in Medicine
April 14, 2013

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The General Medical Council (UK) published new guidelines that state, “If you identify yourself as a doctor in publicly accessible social media, you should also identify yourself by name. Any material written by authors who represent themselves as doctors is likely to be taken on trust and may reasonably be taken to represent the views of the profession more widely.”  This has …

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Why doctors should use their real name on Twitter

Twitter makes me a better doctor: 4 reasons why I use Twitter

Social Media in Medicine
March 25, 2013

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Even as social media use among physicians gains popularity, I continue to hear doubts echoing from my fellow medical students, residents, and attendings, particularly about the use of Twitter.

Many of them ask how using Twitter has benefited me, and my answer almost always makes them stop and think.

My life has been enriched by the network of intelligent and forward-thinking people I have connected with …

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Twitter makes me a better doctor: 4 reasons why I use Twitter

Providers should think seriously about leveraging online reviews

Social Media in Medicine
March 10, 2013

In 2012, tension over online doctor reviews ran high. As the New York Times reported, physicians were turning to third-party reputation management firms who used legal threats to silence critical patients on the web. Information freedom non-profits and tech media outlets responded with investigations and an FTC complaint.

As a former practitioner, I sympathize with some doctors’ apprehension about online reviews; the desire to protect oneself from unfair …

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Providers should think seriously about leveraging online reviews

4 reasons parents should enforce the age restriction on social media

Social Media in Medicine
February 21, 2013

During a routine office visit, I was discussing activities and extracurriculars with a bright 10-year old girl. She loved talking about her dance team, gymnastics, and her new hobby of horseback riding.

Towards the end of our conversation, however, she said something that surprised me: “And, I am addicted to Pinterest.”

I turned to her mother, who was also in the exam room, and asked, “Did you know she is on Pinterest? …

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4 reasons parents should enforce the age restriction on social media

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