So the other night I was contemplating my dilemma about switching from Typepad to WordPress. I floated the question out on Twitter and received within 10 minutes about 13 responses (via feed and DM) on what I should do. Most of these responses were from smart folks who know more than I do. Not all agreed but the majority offered similar advice. There was some consensus on how I might approach the situation.

Why don’t doctors do this? There are 60,000 Fellows in the American Academy of Pediatrics, for example. Assuming all maintained Twitter accounts, at any given time there would be a boatload of babydocs available for dialogue. Then consider the case of a solo doc the Texas Panhandle who finds himself with a simple dilemma or question that needs immediate feedback. Depending on the human filter tailored by that pediatrician, consensus would be close at hand.

Doctors should be crowdsourcing. And crowdsourcing for our benefit and the benefit our patients, not as a Pharma-fueled vehicle for monetization. Given microblog space limitations and the obvious concerns of patient privacy, this platform would work for simple, direct questions that don’t disclose unique patient information.

Why wait? If every pediatrician in the AAP jumped in today we could give it a dry run.