Syndicom

What’s the web good for? Finding good physicians, getting advice and researching medical devices!

Two recent articles on iHealthbeat this month discuss the ways physicians use the Internet hint at the fact, that as a group, physicians are starting to use the Internet and web 2.0 technologies in particular, like many of their patients. According to Manhattan Research, in 2006 64% of doctors went online to find information on medical devices, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. That number has increased in 2008 to 84% of physicians with those participating in the study (1681 practicing US physicians) reporting they would like to access that same information through online or electronic sources 54% of the time.

In the second article, the Dow Jones (Knight, 7/22) reports an increasing number of physicians using video profiles on their practice websites to provide patients with more information about their practice, specialties and relationality. The Dow Jones reports that this will become an increasingly important standard of practice as physicians try to gain a competitive edge. With a recent study out about cancer specialists lacking empathy, it might be important to consider such an activity. While such ‘promotion’, should be approached skeptically, I do think it speaks to the amount of disconnect patients experience within the current healthcare system and may help re-connect, at some level, the patient-provider relationship. I have seen the videos done by Jeffrey Wang at UCLA where he addresses simple patient questions and think they are wonderful for their information, but also to get a sense of the person.

Finally, Shane Schick from ComputerWorld Canada recently wrote an article on the debut of Asklepios, a social networking tool created by the Canadian Medical Association to encourage physicians to take a Facebook approach to exchanging information about patients in their care. The CMA already offers an online portal, MyDoctor.ca to facilitate patient-provider communication but Asklepios is designed to provide a community for geographically dispersed professionals to seek advice from their peers. The network works very similarly to SpineConnect, as evidenced in the following example from Dr Jay Mercer, ““I put a question on the pilot (version of Asklepios) and got some very useful hints that I wasn’t aware of,” he said. “I’ve been in practice for a while, but these were great ideas on how to more reliably get the samples I needed. And these were two physicians that are not in my own network in Ottawa. One was from Toronto and one, who offered some really useful information, was from B.C.”

While physicians lag behind nurses and medical students in terms of the uptake of web 2.0 technology, their take-up is quite rapid for things that fit easily into their work processes and help with productivity and delivering good quality care. One third of physicians now have online blogs and as the CMA concludes, “We always had a registry of doctors that was online that you could search. Allowing them to connect with each other just seems like the natural next step.” Moreover, once physicians have tried a tool, they are quite happy to tell others about it. As Jay Mercer comments ““We tried to run a very restricted pilot, but we weren’t successful, because the people in the pilot then invited their friends.”

Yep - good things happen when we connect!

With thanks to ‘that other guy’ and Daniel Pigatto for their excellent images!

Kirsten Broadfoot