Over the past 4 years every presentation done by a doctor involving new media has involved some statistic of social media use.  Every year the numbers of doctors using Facebook has risen.  Every year more doctors seem to step out in public with Twitter.  The graphs just keep going up.

We’ll soon approach the point where it’s no longer relevant to measure.  Sure use will achieve further growth going forward.  And the data creatives will always find something to measure.  But independent of whether we accept it as part of our core workflow, anyone with their head anywhere but squarely in the sand has largely accepted the reality of public communication.

Parsing personal and professional use will never offer a meaningful answer as our personal and public identities become more difficult to discern (this is like trying to understand what percentage of our IRL or phone conversations are professional versus personal). Those refusing to connect with anyone beyond their 8 x 10, fluorescent-lit exam rooms will ultimately fall over and die.  Those coming into medicine will see networked dialog with patients and peers as nothing other than an operational reality.  Life will go on.  Connected.  Social media will be like a piece of furniture in our environment.

When we stop counting, we’ve arrived.

There was once a time when measured mobile phone adoption.  I haven’t seen one of those studies in a while.  And the last I checked everyone’s mobile and most folks are back to calling them phones.