Twitter's new role in the Healthcare Industry

www.zesty.co.uk

In the space of a few short years, Twitter has grown from several strands of inconsequential drivel to an information powerhouse. Originally conceived as a way to keep up to date with a small network of friends and family, the micro-blogging model, which sees the rapid exchange of quick-fire information, was soon recognised as an invaluable resource for professional organizations.

An area that has benefited in particular from this format is the healthcare industry, where the output of short bursts of relevant news and developments can mean the difference between life and death. Social media sites such as Twitter now represent the largest source of healthcare discussion in the world. Just as celebrities have found Twitter a useful platform for communicating directly with fans, Tweets cut out the media coverage middleman when it comes to providing accurate news in real time from healthcare professionals. Read on to find out how medical authorities and industry experts are using twitter accounts to change the way healthcare is delivered.

Reaching out to a wider audience

From Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, to NHS organisations, hospitals and individual GPs, twitter offers an effective and efficient means of communication. With only 140 characters to work with, even the heavyweights in healthcare still have time to Tweet. Unlike Facebook, where privacy settings dictate the visibility of the status updates, Twitter works on a more open and accessible system. As the length of Tweets are limited, the information is also more likely to be regularly updated. So when a hospital needs to alert staff and patients about problems with a service, there’s a good chance the Tweet will have saved a lot of time and hassle all round.

Direct communication with followers

The Internet has changed the landscape of public opinion and freedom of speech forever. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the stream of Twitter feeds where anyone with an interesting or controversial opinion can suddenly be propelled to Twitter stardom. The healthcare industry can only thrive if the relationship between patient/consumer and provider is nurtured. By receiving direct communication from the people who use their services everyday in the form of criticism, comments and suggestions, the healthcare industry can better understand what areas require improvement.

The power of the hashtag

Twitter takes some aspects of traditional forms of media and combines them with the best practices in social media that encourage cross-network conversation between users. Hashtags help to collect information about a topic and present them for anyone wishing to find opinions about that topic or contribute to the discussion. For users wishing to get involved in conversations about social media in healthcare, a useful hashtag is #HCSM where you can find all the latest news from healthcare innovators such as ‘medical futurist’ Bertalan Mesko.

Twitter chats are usually hour-long conversations that focus on a number of topics related to the main hashtag. For example, in the transcript from the last #HCSM Tweetchat on the 15th December participants were asked what they had learned from HCSM over the past year.

You can choose to join in on the conversation or ‘lurkers’ can take a step back and observe. Whether you’re simply curious about the latest news circulating or want your voice to be heard loud and clear, Twitter is one of the best places around for finding like-minded individuals. This sense of community is extremely relevant for people with rare or chronic conditions who want to interact directly with healthcare professionals or seek support and reassurance from other sufferers.

Campaigns and Charitable Causes

The speedy dissemination of information makes Twitter an ideal tool for organising large gatherings, protests or even riots. Fortunately, this feature also helps to provide awareness of health campaigns and worthy causes. The NHS Stoptober campaign, reached almost 20,000 followers and this Christmas’ Winter Friends Pledge, which urges people to check in on an elderly neighbour this winter, has been actively endorsed on Twitter by Mumsnet, Stephen Fry, and actress Joanna Lumley.

Small charities, not-for-profit organisations and even individuals looking to fund their healthcare needs have turned to Twitter as a powerful, free platform for generating donations. Since the cost of advertising on Twitter is zero, employees can exert more energy forging connections and gaining followers. With the right social media skills, many of these followers can then be converted into regular donators.

Charities have even made money from investing in Twitter. It was recently reported that the Wellcome Trust, a charity for medical research, profited considerablyfrom “the post-year end IPO of Twitter’s, where our stake of more than 1% was marked up by more than $100 million.”

Twitter is also a great place to connect people who want to be generous with those who need it most. After being touched by a huge display of support from Twitter users following a recent injury, footballer Micah Richards has raised the amount he is donating to charity from £20,000 to £25,000. One of the lucky beneficiaries isRuby Leigh Jackson, a six-year-old sufferer of cerebral palsy in need of an operation.

Emergency Situations

Twitter has been in invaluable resource in emergency situations around the world, such as during the aftermath of typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines. A study by the Red Cross show that people are increasingly using social media as a vital resource for organising relief, helping families and friends find each other and discovering the scale of damage caused.

On the 25th September Twitter announced the launch of a new alert system to help organisations ‘enhance the visibility of critical Tweets.’ Services using the alert system, including the London Fire Brigade, Foreign Office and Environment Agency, can mark an important Tweet with an orange bell. Followers will then receive a text alert in the event of an emergency situation. It is hoped that these Tweets will act as warnings of imminent danger, provide evacuation instructions and information about resources.

Twitter analytics

The scope for reaching meaningful conclusions through analysis of Twitter feeds is immense. Researchers have already learned a lot about the way healthcare information travels through social media and how to successfully track epidemics. Symplur is a company that aims to ‘connect the dots in healthcare social media’. So far Symplur’s big data includes 170 million healthcare Tweets, 3.4 million healthcare Twitter profiles and 1,500 health communities. These analytics may benefit ‘public health organizations, governmental agencies, communication agencies, pharmaceutical companies, healthcare researches and academia.’ One of Symplur’s major undertakings is The Healthcare Hashtag Project, which aims to make finding relevant hashtags easier for the healthcare community and providers.

The most astonishing benefit for healthcare providers is in Twitter’s proven capacity to accurately track and predict outbreaks of disease and epidemics. In the same way that Google has been tracking the spread of influenza through related search terms since 2008, Twitter analysis has shown the same principle can be applied to Tweets. One good example of this is the cholera outbreak that effected Haiti in 2010. Researchers found that analysis of real-time Tweets could have led to early detection of the outbreak, as this information was available up to two weeks earlier than reports from official sources.

In a study conducted at John Hopkins University it was discovered that many people put very revealing health information on their Twitter feeds, such as their symptoms, self-diagnosis, the medication they are using to treat the problem and the effects it is having. The researchers supposed that much of this information is not recorded in any official health record and could provide insights into common health misconceptions that need to be addressed, such as when to use antibiotics.

Written by Team Zesty

www.zesty.co.uk

Jackie N.

MSN, MBA-MHM, BComp-Sc, BSN-RN

9y

Quite interesting and informative

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Mostafa Hifnawy

Assistant Care and Support Manager

9y

This is a great opportunity to have our thoughts spread out in the eye of our communities and social life

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Carol Bush BS RN CHPN

Palliative Care Nurse Activist | Community Impact Strategist | #CrazyMemaw

9y

Amen! I think some if the most potentially powerful....but later adopters include my own profession.... Oncology Nurses! As one of the most trusted professions, people depend on as as curators of evidence based care... We need to claim the space and share!!!

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Kelli Murray

Investor | Coach | Startup Junkie | Farmer | Tedx

9y

There is certainly a lot of room for growth of the healthcare industry in its use of social media. I think there's a learning curve however, for healthcare professionals to understand the value and benefit in addition to knowing how to best put these types of tools to good use; particularly Twitter. You can find me @Med_Speaks

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