Social Media: The New Impact Factor?

Social Media in Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery: What Is #Trending on Instagram?

“…The SGO website additionally provides a list of social media hashtags that can be used for disease-or event-specific posts. Barriers to provider participation on social media include "unfamiliarity with social media use or lack of social media skills, apprehension for legal repercussions, concern about privacy infringement of the individual or patients, and vulnerability of intellectual property" [9]. Anecdotally, providers also find heavy clinical load and time as barriers to participation.…”

“…Healthcare professional presence on social media also has risks of violation of personal−professional boundaries [10]. Of the healthcare providers who do participate on social media, few are present on patient-driven communities online (3%), on Twitter (3%), and on Facebook (15%) [9]. Healthcare professionals with access to these patient sites have documented the benefit of being able to observe doctor and healthcare professional representation, exchange of medical advice between patients with no medical training, recruitment of patients by malpractice law groups, and "doctor bashing" and other inflammatory messages from nonmedical individuals [11].…”