When it comes to the social media landscape doctors are scarce. Few on Twitter and fewer with blogs. Maybe we’re socially lazy.
Or maybe we’re just taking it all in.
This piece last week by Mitch Joel of Six Pixels of Separation caught my eye with In Praise of Lazy and reminded me that despite the how we may want to see things, most of us aren’t interested in creating content. In fact, he describes a 1% rule – only 1% of the audience will take time to actually create content.
I suspect that if we were to take the time and do the survey properly, we would find that physicians too are largely new media consumers – or spectators, joiners or collectors in the Forrester sense of the word. Physicians, in fact, might adhere to something of a 0.1% rule. Like Peter Sellers as Chance the Gardner in the 1979 classic, Being There, we “like to watch.”
I did an experiment recently. I emailed a half dozen of my colleagues and asked them to peek at a recent controversial 33 charts post and then offer their comments below the post. Not one did. However four emailed their thoughts – passionate, insightful stuff. When I asked why they wouldn’t formally comment they demurred. They expressed a mishmash of concerns over their privacy and ‘being seen’.
Doctors have a real problem with this kind of transparent exposure. They’re willing to listen, it seems. But dialogue’s another issue. So maybe it isn’t Sermo’s design after all but rather the social constitution of the MD.
This is really unfortunate. Collectively physicians have a voice that could be leveraged for real change on a variety of levels. I have several docs in my referral area in Houston who would thrive on the process of putting their life experience and passion into print, sound or video.
While I don’t think we should expect to ever see large numbers of physicians creating content, will this change? Probably.
Education. The role of social in public health and education needs to be part of primary medical school training. Medical students should be actively involved in the creation of media and the dialog it creates.
Exposure. Those of us involved in this medium need to share it with our colleagues. It will take somewhere somehow.
Evolution. Patience is also a strategy. Physicians are late adopters. Look for this pattern of watching over creating to change over the coming decade.
Your thoughts? Especially if you’re a physician and you’re willing to talk (email not accepted).
{ 14 comments }
I’ll leave a comment, Bryan. I’m going to print this off and use it as part of the curriculum on social media for TMA’s new Leadership College.
THANKS
Ditto, ditto, ditto.
I send out e-mails to friends & colleagues monthly when I write a post that is relevant to their work, insight, experience. I want to have their thoughts and opinion color what I’ve written. I KNOW there are times my peers will disagree with me. I want to reflect the dissonance. It’s an important part of medicine. I often say to my patients, “If you surveyed 10 pediatricians on this, 3 would say ‘yes,’ 3 would say ‘no’ and 3 would say ‘I don’t know’” Most of medicine is full of uncertainty, we use research, experience, and instinct to help our patients. The same has to be true online.
Like you, I usually send the e-mail to about a dozen docs. The response is ALWAYS the same, 1 comments on the blog (if I’m lucky), 2 e-mail me privately (incredible stuff), and 9 sit out there silent.
Sometimes I’m discouraged by the silence–sometimes energized to do more. As physicians, I believe we are responsible for sharing our stories and expertise outside the clinic walls, particularly online. It seems, there is reticence to tell stories & share opinion–but I don’t know if it is always a transparency issue. Like you, my husband (also an MD) feels it may simply be laziness, or rather, overwhelm with the volumes of e-mail/paperwork/reading that make up our lives as physicians. Somehow we have to improve physician efficiency by sharing opinions online.
My blog posts now SAVE me time with families. I can direct them to a set of blog posts on research and focus on other topics during our visits…
Somehow we need to incorporate MD online expression into our work day. Ultimately we want to inform, educate and empower our patients—this is the way to do it!
Interesting insight, Wendy. It looks like there’s some consistency in doctors between Houston and Seattle. I would agree with your husband’s thoughts but favor the idea of limited bandwidth. I didn’t go into it but the issue of passion for medicine is a key element in taking that step to speaking and sharing. That’s perhaps the missing piece.
If its any consolation I think we’ll see a consolidation of social platforms and EMR within our professional lifetime. Integration with workflow is a key element to adoption.
Thanks for your thoughts.
> consolidation of social platforms and EMR within our professional lifetime.
I am optimistic!
It is very heartening to see such open discussions and concerns being expressed. While forward thinking physicians like you in the West are striving to get things work for your colleagues, our side of the world is yet to even think of entering into it! There I see an opportunity to educate in phases and get the idea integrated into new age doctors who are emerging in a global scenario.
You and I have talked about this issue so many times over the years, Bryan, I’ve lost count! I’m at a true loss to find an explanation. I wrote an article on this on HCPLive last year and raised similar ideas as you have in your many articles on the subject that KevinMD republished on his blog as well. Here’s the original article: http://www.hcplive.com/primary-care/publications/mdng-primarycare/2009/Oct2009/Social_Media_Notebook
On KevinMD, there were some interesting comments about this topic that people may want to read: http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2010/01/doctors-fail-embrace-health-20.html
I found it interesting how the people who commented simple did not want to recognize what many of us see – that docs are not embracing social media and technology in a widespread and comfortable way.
We have a lot of work to do to convince our colleagues this is important. I refuse to give up, whether it be for the reasons I cited in my article, or for the reasons you cited in yours. Our patients are using social media and I feel strongly we must as well.
Amen. As a recent patron at the Web 2.0 buffet, I certainly found it easy to spectate and remain aloof from the fray. But I dove in around April of this year by posting ridiculous satirical videos on YouTube. Using my actual face, no less. Very scary, as a full time practicing physician with a very tech savvy patient base. But you know, it’s been a fantastic, rewarding experience, and I’ve been amazed by the support I’ve gotten. It feels good to contribute something for once.
However, I have been quite aware that physicians tend not to leave comments and feedback and engage as much as others (nurses, pharmacists, medical students, the lay public). But I agree that as this current crop of medical students ripen, we are going to see a LOT more activity and contribution from physicians. And they will make very sophisticated hecklers…looking forward to it!
I’ve been using computers and the web since I started private practice in 2002, however, I find two hurtles. First, time. It takes time to put your thoughts onto a page coherently. When you work 12-14 hours a day with a young family at home, it leaves little time to compose thoughts for public consumption.
Second, exposure. Your “digital presence” is exposure, and if most physicians are like me, they are worried about how that exposure will affect their business. You are always looking over your shoulder to ensure you crossed the “t’s” and dotted the “i” because someone is inevitably going to request your records and look over them with a fine tooth comb. We are used to being individually scrutinized and we recognize that our practices benefit or suffer from it. Patient’s are picky. Patient’s are consumers. If your public exposure through the digital prose is not positive, it effects your bottom line. Social media opens us up to even more scrutinization (is that a word?).
I think that as we learn to use are time and protect our exposure in ways that are productive and helpful we will see an increase in social media use by a larger portion of the medical community.
Interesting post . . . Thanks
Bryan-
Interesting post.
As an avid reader and first commenter on your blog, I’d like to put a check in the “lack of time” column on this one. And also wonder how docs compare to other traditional careered folks like lawyers and educators in this aspect, and suspect we are all in the same boat. As opposed to the folks who use social media in their jobs – techies, marketers, media folk.
Peggy
Docs are unlike other professions in that our focus on self-promotion and marketing is minimal. Exception is bariatric and plastics who seem overly represented. And agreed…time is the true currency here.
I loved your article and found it very insightful. I would imagine as the online world gets less and less scary when it comes to content submission, that doctors and other health care professionals will get more comfortable sharing their thoughts and opinions without realizing that each word/letter has to be perfect. Looking human online can be a charming thing sometimes.
Thank you again.
james
Thanks, James. I really rework what I write and probably need to strive to be more spontaneous. And yes, the human side of spontaneity can be charming.
I’m so happy to see physicians willing to talk about social media and the benefits it can bring to your practice. In particular, I love Dr. Swanson’s comments:
“As physicians, I believe we are responsible for sharing our stories and expertise outside the clinic walls, particularly online. … My blog posts now SAVE me time with families. I can direct them to a set of blog posts on research and focus on other topics during our visits.”
I have been using social media in the medical space for about 2 years and have been in health care for nearly 20 years. I cannot tell you how much the use of social media has contributed to the engagement of our patient base and their willingness to be practice evangelists – shouting the praises of the doctors from rooftops (virtual rooftops, of course… real ones are dangerous). The patients feel so much more connected to the physicians and on such a more personal level. (Not that they have to know what you had for dinner last night, but to know you and your practice team as human beings).
Show patients a peek into your world – a “behind the scenes” look into your practice. What do I mean? Post office party photos, weekend picnics, fishing trip photos, Dr. Brown blowing out her birthday cake candles, or Nurse Beth’s newborn baby, to name a few ideas. (All with proper consents, that goes without saying.)
Isn’t it true that when we know professionals on a deeper, more personal level, we feel more connected to and thus, more loyal? I know that it’s true for me (and I’m your consumer – so I will take a shot at saying your patient feels the same way).
Keeping patients loyal to your practice is a very good thing. Just think of the lifetime value of each patient, and then multiply that by the number of people they will refer to you over that period of time. And when you want to sell your practice (?!) how nice would it be to know that you have a steady stream to quantify and to feel confident, really confident, that the patients won’t go somewhere else.
TIME: OK, you all mentioned the very thing that social media costs you: time. But if you only have time to post one blog article a month, that’s a start! You can hire people to help you. Think of it like dry cleaning. You COULD wash and iron your own lab coats, but why would you? Social media is the same way. You don’t want to have anyone impersonate you, but you can certainly have a practice spokesperson speak/post on behalf of the practice.
This person has to know the rules of social media engagement, as well as have good medical knowledge so they can “talk the talk” in a coherent way on your behalf. But this is not that hard to do… there are plenty of people with the right background and training. There might be someone in your practice right now who could take this on with the proper training!
Here are a few quick articles on the subject of physicians using social media you might find helpful:
American Medical Assn: http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2010/06/14/bica0614.htm
American Medical Assn: http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2010/08/09/bil20809.htm
American Medical Assn: http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2010/09/06/prl20906.htm
Modern Medicine / Dermatology Times: http://budurl.com/3esm
Modern Medicine/ Dermatology Times: http://budurl.com/dgb6
-Monique
I have found a large, energetic and interesting group of doctors on twitter who share their medicine, their lives and their humor with humble power. They rock!! You can find them by following my doctor lists at http://twitter.com/mtmnd
One benefit of doctors sharing is they will regain their mantle of leadership, which I think has been tarnished. The easier flow of information will assist with a broader understanding of issues that, before this, were only experienced in their offices and in the doctor’s lounge. It is time well spent.
Thanks for the great post.
Kelly – That is so encouraging to hear. Social may be the foundation that on which that mantle is built. Thank you.