More than half of U.S. adults turn to the Internet when they have health or medical questions, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center. (Did we really need a research center to tell us that?) More alarmingly, a survey in April found that 50 percent of doctors turn to Wikipedia for medical info!

How does Wikipedia fare as a medical reference? Its collaborative, user-generated philosophy generally means that errors are caught and corrected quickly. Several studies, including one examining health information, another probing articles on surgery, and one focusing on drugs, found the online encyclopedia to be almost entirely free of factual errors.

Better still, the articles improve significantly with time, according to a study Clauson published last December in the The Annals of Pharmacotherapy (vol 42, p 1814). “Wikipedia’s editing policy does work,” he says.

Read the article at newscientist.com

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Embedded below are slides from a presentation from Bob Coffield titled “PHRs, Health 2.0 and the Impact of Social Media on Health Care”. It was given at the American Health Lawyers Association 2009 annual meeting in Washington, DC.

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A few weeks ago we discussed the rapidly growing relationship between medical technologies and the Web2.0, or more specifically, the iPhone. Technologies like Apple’s iPhone is helping to bridge the gap for a new revolutionary healthcare marketplace. For facts about this drastically changing market, take a look at this video, Facts About Social Media in Healthcare.

Today I came across a new iPhone application that allows you to zoom in and identify an individual bone or part of a bone within the full skeleton. It has been designed to accommodate medical professionals as well as medical students from basic to advanced level of anatomical medical knowledge.

The user is presented with a high-quality 3D model/image of the full skeleton. The user can zoom in to any area – by tapping on a region – tapping again will zoom in further – eventually the user will have zoomed into a individual bone, bone region or ligament. The user can then identify the different parts by pressing on the flags. Each label is in English and in Latin and by pressing on the ‘i’ icon the user can access additional information on a label. There is also a super Magnification Mode that greatly magnifies a bone part allowing the user to press on flags that are close together!

YouTube Link

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Take a look at the latest chart of US Hospitals that are on YouTube and Twitter. Currently 213 Twitter accounts and 142 YouTube Channels!

As more hospitals launch their social media campaigns, it is more likely that your own medical lead generation could get lost in the Web2.0 land rush. Here’s a few tips to help keep your own healthcare online marketing campaign head and shoulders above the rest.

1. Don’t use social networking robots. There are a lot of sites out there that can provide a lot of empty stats like lots of followers and fans, but the real metric that counts is the amount of interaction your campaign receives.
2. To receive more interaction with your readers and followers remember that social networking is all about sharing. Launch a giveaway, host a contest, or provide some kind of content that is unique to your industry.
3. To keep your campaign fresh and dynamic, assign a creative person inside your organization to run your social network accounts. They should show a strong knowledge on how the social campaigns function.

There are many different types of social networks that your business could use, so make an informed decision about what kind of network best suits your company’s personality. For example, take a look at this pie chart of the types of platform that US hospitals are using.

If you have questions about how the healthcare industry is using social media for medical lead generation and branding leave us a comment, talk to us on Twitter, or find us on Facebook.

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Currently on the front page of Digg.com’s health section is an article from Reuters. Here’s a brief summary:

As many as 75 percent of U.S. doctors will be writing electronic prescriptions within five years, thanks to new federal spending to encourage e-prescribing, according to a forecast released on Monday.

The economic stimulus bill signed by President Barack Obama last month included about $19 billion to promote the use of healthcare information technology, including e-prescribing.

Reuters article here.

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The future of microblogging (Twitter) and the health care industry has a lot of exciting possibilities. I recently viewed a presentation on the future of Twitter and the health care industry and here is a summary of some of the ideas discussed.

Twitter for Medical Students
- Contact and seek advice for medicine related questions from educators around the world
- Get feedback easily on ideas and projects
- Students can follow doctors and see what their everyday lives are like
- Prepare themselves for practicing medicine
- A point of health care news, information, and knowledge sharing platform for medical students

Twitter for Patient and Doctor Communication
- Useful as a daily/weekly reminder to patients with chronic conditions
- Educating and helping patients will have a positive impact on their health

Twitter for Doctors
- Create a Twitter page for every doctor in the hospital (or at least a test group of doctors)
- Increases productivity and efficiency at the hospitals as everyone is updated on the activities of the doctors

Twitter for Hospitals
- Reputation management for customer feedback
- Improve customer service at hospitals
- Improved patient care

Twitter for Medical Devices
- A diabetic patient monitors his/her blood sugar and whenever there is a serious difference from normal values, the doctor receives a tweet about it
- High blood pressure patients measures his/her blood pressure and when the value is serious, the doctor receives a tweet
- A pregnant mother wears a monitoring device which tweets stats like heart rate and other activity. For example, the Kickbee.

The Kickbee is a wearable device made of a stretchable band and embedded electronics and sensors. When a baby kicks, a Twitter message is posted. (Read more about the Kickbee)

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