I recently attended an impressive webinar put on by HealthWorks Collective, called “Can Healthcare Providers Afford to Ignore Social Media?” 

 The moderators and participants made it a great webinar and the tweet chat going on during the program added a lot of value to the presentation.  I was especially impressed with one of the experts on the panel, Ed Bennett, ( @EdBennett is his Twitter handle ) both for his expertise and for a great resource he provides on his website, the Hospital Social Network List.

 Ed’s Hospital Social Network List breaks down a huge list of over 1200 hospitals nationwide and provides their various social networking links, which gives access to these media, but also helps us to get a bird’s eye view of how hospitals are using this vital tool as well.

Here are a few takeaways I jotted down during the webinar.  I’d recommend listening to the recording and seeing what other gems you’re able to find! Or contacting HealthWorks Collective for their next presentation.

  • Hospitals need to have a social media policy in place ahead of time to deal with an online crisis.  Social media is a powerful force for organizing efforts quickly and sharing information in the case of an emergency (ex: a hurricane, tornado or earthquake) that can put your hospital in the spotlight.
  • Your patients are tweeting about you and sharing their thoughts and opinions on Facebook and other sites.  You can’t stop that.  The best thing you can do is accept it and join the conversation, addressing concerns and showing appreciation for positive feedback.
  • Healthcare organizations can’t look at social media as a business expense requiring justification from an ROI standpoint.  Ed Bennett likened that to trying to gauge the ROI of using a telephone.  Talking to your customers is priceless.  In 2012, social media is how you do it.
  • One participant brought up an unfortunate truth:  the healthcare industry typically runs 5-10 years behind in adopting new technologies.  In this case, the technology and media options changes too quickly to allow that kind of delay, so hospitals need to make a special effort to get on board quickly and focus on taking full advantage of social media.
  • A safe and effective way to get started,  if your organization is not yet part of the social media landscape, is to get something set up internally (an internal blog for employees, Yammer, or just some conversation around how to communicate with your patients,) then move it to an external blog, Facebook page or other social media platform that makes sense for your situation.
  • A few other drivers pushing healthcare organizations to adopt social media are transparency, accountable care, and professional networking within the industry.

I think there are a lot of reasons why healthcare can “NOT” ignore social media any more…What do you think?  Can hospitals or independent practices afford to ignore social media?  Let’s talk about it in the comments.

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