This document summarizes a presentation on the professional use of social media for medical students and physicians. It discusses potential benefits of using social media for medical education and careers. It also outlines principles for safe and professional social media use, including protecting patient privacy and maintaining a factual, polite and attributed online presence. The presentation examines case studies and offers suggestions for appropriate social media use during medical school. It emphasizes establishing an online identity that represents oneself as a professional.

1. Professional Use of
Social Media
Presentation to uOttawa Undergraduate Medical Education Program
Sept. 4, 2019
Pat Rich
@Pat_Health #UOSM19

2. Lecture objectives
• Discuss the potential of social networking tools such as
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ in medical
education.
• Discuss the safe and professional behaviours regarding
social networking usage.

3. The Song Remains The Same

4. Disclosures
• Social media has provided me and
continues to provide me with
income and career advancement

5. Who I am
• Medical writer, editor and social media
commentator
• Experienced health care communicator with a
keen interest and involvement in the use of social
media tools in medicine and health care and
believer in the value of these tools
• WHO I AM NOT
• Physician
• Academic (well, not really)

6. Professional use of social media

7. Some words of wisdom (Dr. Joshua Tepper)

8. It’s not rocket science
I think there are too many people on the Web offering
advice to you on how to use social media. Most of this
advice is just regurgitated advice from people you may
never have heard of before,
…You really don’t need “How To” tips on blogging or
Twitter. Oh, I’m confident that you’ll be told otherwise
– but those folks, well-intentioned as they may be,
don’t understand that you’re smarter than that.
Rather than learn bad habits from the get-go, take
advantage of your lack of experience. It’s okay to make
mistakes that don’t cause harm and violate the privacy
and dignity of others.
From: Physician Social Media: Has Advice About It Become a Crock? Yes
@philbaumann, Jan. 1, 2013

9. But it can explode on you

11. Three cases
• Case 1: After a night out with friends, Kiara– a first year medical student – awakes in the morning to
find pictures of herself enjoying beer at a pub with friends. Are these pictures appropriate?
• Case 2: Brandon is a resident who, since starting medical school, has kept a blog about his views on
medicine, medical education, and health care politics. Recently, Brandon has blogged extensively
about his extreme political views regarding the upcoming election. His residency director reads his
blog and tells him that he must delete his posts as he is not only a hospital employee and a
representative of the residency program, but also a professional who must represent himself
accordingly
• Case 3: Susan is a psychiatrist who is treating a patient who is unwilling to reveal little or any personal
information. Susan believes a better understanding of the patient and his individual circumstances
would aid her in providing more better treatment. To do this, Susan decides to look the patient up on
Google to see what – if anything has been written about him.

12. Why care?
“Whether physicians are active on social media or
not, an understanding of social media and its
potential implications on their professional lives is
essential.”
Dr. Hartley Stern, CEO, Canadian Medical Protective Association

13. “
”
Within the next decade you won’t
be able to be a successful scholar
without having some activity on
social media
Dr. Jason Frank, Director of Emergency Medicine, uOttawa and Director of Specialty
Education, Policy, and Standards in the Office of Education at the Royal College of
Physicians and Surgeons of Canada

14. “
”
Welcome to the future of the
adjunct to medical training where
doctors and nurses are no longer
dispassionate enigmas; we’re
humans with online lives, dog
pictures and grief that we need to
process
Tricia Pendergast (on the sheMD blog, May 31, 2019)

16. Being a digital doctor
Maybe you won't becoming a
tweeting, blogging doctor. But, what
content will you publish in order to
establish a healthy digital presence for
yourself or your practice? …Will you be
prepared to help steer the
conversation back towards science
when celebrities hijack the
conversation with something
otherwise?
@thedocsmitty

17. Why care?

18. Using social media as a medical student
or physician
•
•
•

19. Participate in meaningful progress
“Physicians of all ages are using social media, and many women are communicating
on virtual platforms to connect with each other and with supportive male colleagues.
The sheer number of women physicians participating and their robust engagement
suggest that they value these online connections.”
June 14,
2018
#metoomedicine #illooklikeasurgeon

20. Interact with leaders of the profession

21. Wield the lasso of truth

22. … and become a physician social media superstar

23. Advocacy

24. “Medical politics aren’t for the
faint of heart”
Former Ontario deputy health minister
Michael Decter quoted by Theresa Boyle in
The Toronto Star, Feb. 27, 2017

25. Live tweeting from medical conferences

26. Social media and academic medicine
“Social media is a tool that the modern scholar and scientist should have in their
armamentarium”
* Being engaged in social media can assist you in your academic work by
cultivating mentors, raising awareness of your research and scholarship, and
facilitating scholarly collaborations.
* A prominent social media presence has the potential to influence public
opinion and could drive funding for research and education or support
policies consistent with scientific evidence.
Social Media and the 21st-Century Scholar: How You Can Harness
Social Media to Amplify Your Career, Journal of the American
College of Radiology, Jan. 2018, Teresa Chan MD et. Al.

27. Principles for the use of social media
The principles for the
professional use of social
media have not changed
since social media platforms
came into use

28. Principles for use of social media
• Protect patient confidentiality
(default position)
• Be Professional
• Factual and transparent
• Polite (!?)
• Attribute

29. Who is making the rules?
• College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario
Guidelines
• Canadian Federation of Medical Students (CFMS)
Guide to Medical Professionalism:
Recommendations For Social Media
• Canadian Medical Protective Association

30. Don’t Lie, Don’t Pry
Don’t Cheat, Can’t Delete
Don’t Steal. Don’t Reveal
Dr. Farris Timimi, medical director,
Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media,
April 5, 2012

31. The Boundary Fallacy
Keeping a boundary between professional and personal life on social media is
“operationally impossible, lacking in-agreement among active physician social
media users, inconsistent with the concept of professional identity, and potentially
harmful to physician and patients.”
Rather than eliminating boundaries and “suggesting anything goes,” physicians
should just ask themselves whether what they are posting on social media is
appropriate for a physician in a public space – with the issue of the content being
professional or personal being irrelevant.
“Social Media and Physicians’ Online Identity Crisis” published in JAMA, Aug. 14 2013 (v.310, no: 6, 581-
582).

32. Case Studies
• Picture of you with alcohol
• Blogging your views
• Googling patients

33. Case study 1

34. Case Study 3: Variations
Is it OK for Susan to look up the patient:
• If she feared for the safety of the patient
• If she feared for her own safety
• If she worked in the ER
• If she thought her patient may be famous
“Do it if your conscience says there’s a good clinical reason for doing so.”

35. Case Study 3
• “In searching for their patients online, clinicians may be unwittingly setting
legal precedents for mental healthcare. As more and more providers Google
to guide their decisions, they may be shifting the clinical standards to which
all practitioners are held.”
• “If a patient leaves a suicidal message on Facebook, and the clinician misses
it, there’s a future—seemingly more plausible by the day—in which that
clinician could be sued for malpractice if the patient then attempts suicide. ”
Getting Googled By Your Doctor: Erene Stergeopolus

36. Using social media in medical school – some suggestions
• Facebook presence for classmates etc.
• LinkedIn account to:
• Build network for future career
• Follow discussion forums on medical education
• Blog about your experiences
• Instragram – Mobile-friendly image-based slices of life
• Twitter account to:
• Develop your list of people, journals and other accounts to follow
• Watch (and engage) medical Twitter community (e.g. #hcldr)

37. Instagram
“Though few peddle the kind of questionable
medical treatments shilled by celebrities like Dr. Oz
(rapid weight-loss pills with harmful side effects,
for instance) some toe the very blurry line about
what’s appropriate for a health care professional to
post. Mike Varshavski, a cartoonishly handsome
New York City physician who goes by the
name Doctor Mike on Instagram and has more
than 3 million followers, regularly posts sponsored
content for everything from Clorox
bleach to Quaker Oats and American Express,
which could create the perception that these
corporations are somehow medically approved by
this doctor.”
Rebecca Jennings, Vox, The Rise of the Nursefluencer, May 10, 2019

38. Final words of wisdom (Dr. Jalali)

39. Here endeth the lesson.
Thank you!
Questions?
Acknowledgement: Led Zeppelin album cover “Houses of the Holy” Atlantic Records