InCrowd asked 200 healthcare professionals (MDs, NPs, RNs) from across the United States to share their single greatest concern regarding the use of social media in the health setting. Not surprisingly, patient privacy and HIPAA concerns topped the list. Time drain, legal implications and misuse of medical content were almost even as the second greatest concern.
Q. From the list below select your single greatest concern regarding the use of social media in the health care setting; please explain your response in the comment box.
- Time drain for myself / myself and my staff / our department -46 selected
- Legal ramifications -41 selected
- There is no ROI on the health care side -5 selected
- Currently no FDA guidelines in place -4 selected
- HIPAA and patient privacy -56 selected
- Misuse of medical content shared via social media -48 selected
Physician Comments Include:
In addition to HIPAA VIOLATION that can easily occur. Medical knowledge should only be provided by trusted websites or by direct interaction with health care workers. Social media consumes a lot of time that can be used in a better way including patient care.
Two sides to this issue: 1. Patients can tweet/Facebook information about themselves and their physicians. If they send out negative comments about their MD, that hurts the physician. 2. I don’t think medical information should be delivered in this manner…. no way to document information passed on from MD to patient.
Don’t see how it will help better care for patients.
I’m afraid that the boundaries between work and a personal life, which are already blurred in today’s society, will become nonexistent.
Social media does not allow for privacy and if used in healthcare, it’s only a short matter of time before private information is made public, potentially creating egregious harm and damage to persons, reputations, providers, etc. The ramifications are too great to chance on this type of communication.
You can literally spend most of your allotted time talking to patients discussing misinformation from the internet.
I want to keep my private life separate from my professional life.
Information on the media causing lot of confusion among the patients and they end up calling their doctors office to get the information and answers, which take up our considerable/valuable time.
There are occasions when social media misleads its viewers by tailoring the medical content for commercialization or endorsement of a product.
We can’t keep up with demands on our time now and to do more gratis is not acceptable not to mention the misuse of and legal ramifications of…
The internet is rampant with erroneous medical advice. Patients are frequently petrified by a particular diagnosis or treatment option based upon incorrect or misleading information that they found on the internet. Physicians often spend extensive amounts of time reducing patient fears and / or pursuing alternative treatment modalities due to strong patient concerns from inaccurate information from social media sites.
With the era of instant information it is difficult to discern where to draw the line regarding patient information.
It is unreasonable access to medical staff. Patients expect immediate answers-we cannot do that and see our patients.
No rules. No parameters. No regulation. No usual and customary. No Standard for standards or upgrades. A liability nightmare.
There is no ROI on the health care side.
Many of the items listed are of concern, time drain and the unfunded mandate to answer questions, as well as the manner in which the answers might be used without context.
We are already taxed for time with EMRs we don’t have the manpower to introduce social media as well.
