Physicians and social media - ACP Hospitalist features Dr. Rob

From ACP Hospitalist:

"Dr. Lamberts’ words aren’t just vanishing into cyberspace. His blog, Musings of a Distractible Mind, gets about 20,000 visitors who view 50,000 pages a month, according to his own analytics data. By the end of 2009, his list of Twitter followers numbered nearly 1,500 and counting.

Today’s physicians have an ever-expanding number of social media vehicles through which to express themselves. Tools like Twitter, Facebook and blogging can potentially help physicians better educate and interact with patients, perhaps even humanizing themselves in the process. But mishandling that powerful online megaphone can potentially risk, or at the very least blur, the doctor-patient relationship, according to social media-savvy physicians.

Initially, when he was virtually unread, Dr. Lamberts said he blogged about a few interesting cases, always cloaking the patient details. But he soon halted that practice."

I follow a similar approach described in detail in the website disclaimer:

"There is no real life patient data on this website. Please note: we do not write or “blog” about patients. All case descriptions are fictional, similar to the descriptions you can find in a multiple choice questions textbook for board exam preparation. Cases course and description do not follow real cases."

http://clinicalcases.org/2002/01/disclaimer-and-terms-of-use-agreement.html

Image source: OpenClipArt.org, public domain.

Related:

Essential Reading: The Air Force Rules of Engagement for Blogging

The Air Force Rules of Engagement for Blogging (click to enlarge the image).

From the blog Global Nerdy:

"The “rules of engagement” are quite good. You might find them to be useful for your own blogs, whether personal or corporate."

The Air Force has a well-developed web presence which includes:

• The official blog, Air Force Live
• A Twitter account
• A YouTube page
• Widgets and podcasts

References:
The US Air Force: Armed with social media. WebInkNow.

Presidential sleeping habits (CNN video)

Presidential sleeping habits, 2:35 min.

CNN's Jason Carroll looks at the hours worked by past presidents and the lessons President Obama could learn.

Related reading:

Do U.S. presidents age faster in office? Possibly, but 70% actually lived longer than expected. LA Times, 2011.
The Presidents Club | Photos: Oval Office Secrets from Truman to Obama | TIME, 2012.

10 blogging myths debunked from a medical blogger perspective

I have maintained Clinical Cases and Images - Blog since March 2005 and the text below is a commentary on 10 myths of blog marketers debunked by Duncan Riley:

1. Blogging is easy (workload).

False. "Successful bloggers all share the same traits: they work hard, really hard, and often work longer hours."

Writing a medical blog for more than a few months is hard work and requires discipline and finding some reasons to keep going on. Many medical bloggers start posting at a feverish pace with multiple long posts per week but soon "close shop" because of losing interest or burnout. Few last more than a year.

2. Blogging is safe.

False. "Blogging can be a legal minefield that can get you sued when you least expect it."

Blogging is not safe and at least several medical bloggers have been sued or reprimanded by their employers. For example, Dr. Flea was a pediatrician who attempted to blog his malpractice trial and was forced to settle out of court when outed. Dr. Wes, a cardiac electrophysiologist, was subpoenaed for a discovery deposition about one of the posts on his blog.

3. RSS is a license to republish other peoples content.

False."You cross the line with full posts and you can be sued for doing so. Further, splogs (blogs that republish RSS feeds) are rarely successful."

The practice of republishing somebody's full-text RSS content is not widely spread among medical bloggers.

4. Blogging is a replacement for you day job.

False. "Most bloggers start while working other jobs, and only quit their day jobs when their blogs allow them to."

I am aware of only one medical blogger who quit his job as a physician to blog full time. Dr. Kim was a nephrologist who stopped practicing in order to devote his time to his very popular blog MacRumors.com. However, several bloggers have at least part-time jobs as medical journalists.

5. Blogging will make you rich.

False. "Very few one person blogs ever bring in big money. Most large blogs today have a team of writers."

Few medical bloggers are able to earn $200-$1,000 per month from AdSense, paid links and other advertisement options.

6. You can post once a day.

True. "Most successful blogs posts many times a day, and your chances of succeeding when posting once a day a minimal to zero."

This is actually true -- posting once a day is a good routine if you can keep up with it. In most cases, quality is more important than quality but a blog that does not have 2-3 posts per week is considered "dead" for most practical purposes.

7. Traffic is easy to come by.

False. "Attracting traffic on a blog requires hard work, great content, and social interaction outside the blog. Most blogs take a good 6-9 months to truly establish themselves, not just in building traffic, but in building incoming links and good treatment in search engines."

A good stable traffic of visitors to a blog is difficult to achieve and most medical bloggers give up before they reach a significant number of daily visitors (200-300 per day).

Here are some tips for new medical bloggers who want to make their blog popular or at least read by more than just the author:

- Comment on other medical blogs and leave your URL. Make substantial comments and only do it if you have something interesting and/or important to add.

- Submit to Grand Rounds, the weekly medical blog carnival.

8. RSS subscribers are the key and are easy to get.

False. "While having more RSS subscribers will help your blog, they are neither the key to success nor easy to get."

Clinical Cases and Images - Blog has 2,300 RSS subscribers, KevinMD has 16,000 but these numbers are not easy to achieve. However, if I did it, you can probably do it too.

9. Writing for a blog is easy.

False.

Anybody can start a blog for free in just 4 minutes at Blogger.com, one of Google services. Maintaining an interesting blog long-term and making it popular is quite difficult though. You need to publish posts at least several times per week and keep the quality constant.

10. You can blog in your pajamas.

True for most people, I guess.

References:
10 myths of blog marketers debunked. Duncan Riley.
Dr. Flea Blogged His Malpractice Trial, Settles When Outed
Bloggers Beware. Dr. Wes.
My Son, the Blogger: An M.D. Trades Medicine for Apple Rumors. NYTimes.
Tips for New Medical Bloggers: How to Get Noticed?
Image sources: public domain.

Tips for Medical Bloggers on Blogger.com: Topic sections on the blog front page rather than random posts in reverse chronological order

A physician blogger asks: "I would like to put a book review section in by itself. I would really like it to look more like sections on the front page of a newspaper that I could add to separately than one big long blog of such disparate topics."

There are several ways to do this:

1. "Future date" posts always show on the front page.

Fix the number of posts on the front page, for example, to seven (7). Only those posts will show on the front page and they will be your topic sections. Publish the "topic section" posts. Then go back to edit them and change the date to a year in the future, for example, 2011. Then you can keep posting to your blog as usual. The RSS feed will update but only the 7 fixed "future date" posts will show on the front page.

See an example here: http://allergycases.org/

More on the topic:

"I use Google Blogger to publish not only blogs (with posts in reverse chronological order) but also "regular" websites in which the article at the top of the page is not always the newest one. To do this, I often choose a date in the future (for example, 2010) which makes the desired post to stay on top. The "scheduled post" Blogger update eliminated this option but fortunately, there is a workaround:

"We know that some bloggers currently use future post dates in order to keep one post at the top of their blog for a while. Though we recommend that you use a Text page element for this, you can still get this old behavior with just one additional step. First, publish your post with the current date and time. This will publish it to your blog. Then, once it’s published, edit the post to change the date to the future and publish it again. We don’t re-schedule posts that are already published, so the post will stay on your blog but sort to the very top."

References:
How to Use (and Stop Using) Scheduled Posts in Google Blogger

2. Add "text element" to your Blogger sidebar. The text will always show in the sidebar:

References:
Layout Guide. Blogger Help.

3. Use a 3-column template.

To make your blog look more like a newspaper front page, you can use a 3-column template, in addition to the 2 tips explained above.

In any case, the use of a wider (stretch) template is recommended, for example, Minima Stretch.

References:
New blogger templates (XML) 3 columns
Where can I find more templates? Blogger Help

Related:
Tips for Blogs in Medical Education: How do I put a special section just for my students on my blog?
Tips for New Medical Bloggers: How to Get Noticed?
Image sources: public domain.

Tips for Blogs in Medical Education: How do I put a special section just for my students on my blog?

An attending has a medical blog that he uses for education of medical students and residents. He asks the following questions: "How do I put a special section just for my students to access on my blog -- a place that only they could access and possible could even post to... or would that be a separate blog site?"

There are 3 options to do it:

1. Add a label to your posts, for example, "Residents" and label all you resident-related posts with it. Then when you click on that label at the bottom of one post, all posts under that label will show together. You can share that URL with the residents.

Advantage: Simple, no need to create a different blog.

Disadvantage: The label is not secure, anybody can see it and the students cannot edit the posts.

Reference:
How do I label my posts?

2. Start a simple wiki at Google Sites and share it with students via email.

Advantage: Simple, uses the same Google account and login you used to create your blog. The best solution for collaboration to let students add information and edit pages. It is secure and only persons who are granted access can see the site.

Disadvantage: You need to create another website.

Reference:
Google Sites makes creating and sharing a group website easy

3. Start another blog which is open only to invited users.

Advantage: Uses the same platform as your old blog. It is secure and only persons who are granted access can see the site.

Disadvantage: You need to create another website. The residents can see the information after logging in, then you need to grant them access to edit the old posts. The process is not intuitive.

Reference:
How do I control who can view my blog?

Summary

Simplest solution: Add a label to your posts.

Best solution: Start a simple wiki at Google Sites.

Related:
Tips for New Medical Bloggers: How to Get Noticed?
Example Blog Launch Checklist: http://bit.ly/heAfo

Image sources: public domain.

Updated: 05/12/2009

Tips for New Medical Bloggers: How to Get Noticed?

A common scenario: You have a new medical blog with the greatest content ever and you want to share it with world but nobody visits you blog yet. What to do?

Here are some tips for new medical bloggers who want to make their blog popular or at least read by more than just the author:

1. Comment on other medical blogs and leave your URL. Make substantial comments and only do it if you have something interesting and/or important to add.

2. Submit to Grand Rounds, the weekly medical blog carnival.

3. Open a Twitter account and update it when you publish a new post. Link your profile to your blog URL. Follow other medical bloggers on Twitter. Reply to their tweets. Most people on Twitter have at least a cursory look when somebody starts following them.

4. Include your blog URL in your email signature.

5. Post often, preferably daily or at least 2-3 times per week. Active blogs with quality content attract Google bots and eventually may lead to better search engine ranking.


Duty calls. Image source: Xkcd.com, Creative Commons license.

This is a post in a series of brief articles with practical tips for medical bloggers.

From Om Malik's Tips On Blogging:

I started GigaOM (the blog) over seven years ago, and decided to share two things that are two rules I almost always follow, and when I don’t I regret.

1. Wait at least 15 minutes before publishing something you’ve written—this will give you enough distance to edit yourself dispassionately.

2. write everything as if your mom is reading your work, a good way to maintain civility and keep your work comprehensible.

10 Ways To Build Your Readership

View more presentations from Nicole Simon.

10 Ways To Build Your Readership. Nicole Simon.

Related reading:
5 Tips How To Get Noticed By Others In Your Market. LinkWorth, 2007.
11 Tips for Getting Your Comments Noticed on a Popular Blog. ProBlogger, 2007.
How to promote your blog instead of watching your visitor stats. ProBlogger, 2008.
Example Blog Launch Checklist: http://bit.ly/heAfo

Updated: 05/12/2009

100 Tips for Being On Call in the Hospital by Efficient MD and Readers

Joshua Schwimmer, MD, the author of Efficient MD, has assembled a helpful list of 100+ Tips for Being On Call in the Hospital with the help of his blog readers and Twitter followers. This is a good example of harnessing and organizing the wisdom of one (very educated) "crowd."

I have been following Joshua's blogs for years, through his ups and downs of blogging activity (is KidneyNotes on a semi-hiatus?), and he has consistently produced a high-quality and thought-provoking original content.

Joshua says he is not the prototype of the "efficient M.D." but his blog certainly helps everyone who reads it to become one.

Some of the 100+ Tips for Being On Call in the Hospital:

Get outside at least once a day
Make a game of remembering names
Walk more quickly
Take the stairs instead of the elevator
Time yourself
Use a tally counter
Connect with other people who are on call with you

References:
100+ Tips for Being On Call in the Hospital. EfficientMD.
Image source: EfficientMD.com.

Google Docs Offer 300 Templates for Documents, Spreadsheets and Presentations

Google Docs is a useful online word processor, spreadsheet and presentation application. I have used it for years with satisfactory results and it has almost completely replaced Microsoft Office for me. Having a "golden copy" online is very convenient, especially if you work on your documents from your workplace, home and you check them from mobile devices. The local copies of Word documents just don't cut it anymore.

Google Docs launched 300 templates for documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Some of them are listed below:

Personal Budget Spreadsheet

Loan Comparison Tool

2009-yearly-calendar-landscape : Yearly Calendar

Personal Budget Tracker

gas-mileage-log : Mileage Log

to-do-list : ToDoList

Savings Calculator

2008-monthly-calendar-landscape

Job Applicant Scoring : Scoring

Mortgage Payment Calculator

Stock comparison template with built-in Google Finance functions

Net Worth : Sheet

Home Ownership Expense Calculator

2009-yearly-calendar-portrait : Yearly Calendar

Project Management Schedule

Investment Decision Criteria

Personal Monthly Budget

Business Cards

Research Paper

Project Report

Resume

Family Budget Planner


Google Docs in Plain English

Related:
Templates bring Docs to life. Google Official Blog.

Blogger Advice: Communicate with Your Readers Via Free Phone Calls and Chat

Google released 2 new features which allow any blogger with access to the HTML template of their site to embed 2 badges = communication channels for direct contact with readers:

- Free phone calls via Grand Central VOIP service (WebCall Button). The button also allows you to post voice mail to your blog which replaces the now defunct AudioBlogger feature.

- Chat via Google chat (Chatback badge)


This Google video shows it takes about 2 minutes to start a blog on Blogger.com. Creating a web site has never been easier.

References:
Google Talk chatback. Google Talk Blog.
Chatback: Let people comment using Google Talk. Garett Rogers.
Add Google Talk Badge To Your Blog and Chat with Readers Live. Digital Inspiration.
GrandCentral: receive calls and post voicemail with your blog. Blogger Buzz.

BBC: Different Stages of Life

Listen to BBC programs about different stages of life:

Life as a Teenager

Life as an Adult

Life in Middle Age

Life in Old Age

Life after 80

BBC 4 has a streaming Listen Again page and a podcast directory. Subscribing is YouTube-style easy -- you can copy the URL directly, or subscribe via Google Reader/iGoogle or iTunes.

Related:
BBC Podcasts Are Worth Listening To
Four Stages Of Life by The Happy Hospitalist.
Image source: OpenClipArt.org, public domain.

Updated: 07/19/2008

50 Ways to Improve Your Life in 2008 According to U.S. News & World Report

The 50 Ways to Improve Your Life in 2008 are divided in 4 groups:

Your Money
Your Mind
Your World
YourPlay

Don't forget to check the related video by the U.S. News staffers:

Simply Fired - How NOT to Blog About Your Job. Especially If You Are a Doctor

This website is about people/bloggers who got fired when blogging about their job (the site called SimplyFired.com now redirects to the job search engine SimplyHired.com). It should be a must-read for all aspiring bloggers all over the world. Be careful what you write. Now, with the search engines cache and the WayBackMachine, even if you remove the post, it can still be recovered and used against you.

When you blog, think as if your boss is reading it. If you feel uncomfortable about it, just don't post it. Blogging is a public activity, every single word can be potentially scrutinized and inspected for adverse meaning.

Some Good Advice

Mark Jen became the prototype of the fired blogger in 2005 (the original blog has been deleted, the reference link was provided by CNet. Google "kicked him out" after he had posted repeatedly about the company products and future plans on what (he thought) was his private blog. There is no such thing as truly "private" blog on the Internet. Pretty much everything is public and monitored by millions of eyes. The fact that you type your posts from the comfort of your home, does not make your work private. Once you hit the "publish" button, anybody can (and will) read it.

Mark Jen himself gave some good advice after he got fired (Robert Scoble also added a few suggestions):

- Do not start blogging right away after you join a company. Check the corporate culture. See if blogging will fit in the current work environment.

- Enquire if there are any blogging guidelines. If there are, comply with them strictly. If there are no guidelines, try to establish them.

- Let your boss know that you are planning to blog about your job. Ask him/her to check you blog to make sure that it is OK.

Corporate Blogging Guidelines

If it is done right, blogging can be a positive thing for a company. It gives a human face to the corporation. Robert Scoble was a good example how a blogger can improve the public image of a company like Microsoft, which has not been getting much of a good press for a long time (since 2005, Scoble has left Microsoft and now works for Rackspace, a hosting company).

It comes as no surprise that some companies hastily created blogging guidelines, describing what can and what cannot be posted online by its employees/bloggers. Check out the rules published by IBM, Yahoo, Sun, Opera and Plaxo.

Any Guidelines for Medical Bloggers?

Most of the 100 or so doctors (in year 2005) who blog use pseudonyms like "Red State Moron" or "GruntDoc". Unfortunately, you cannot stay anonymous. If somebody tries really hard, they will discover your identity. The best solution is not to post anything that can embarrass you, or your patients. If you are blogging about your patients, make sure that you comply with the HIPAA rules.

To stay out of trouble, always ask yourself: What if my patients are reading this? What if my colleagues are reading it?

Be honest and respectful to others. And once again, remember the HIPAA rules.

A question for the medical bloggers: Should we try to establish guidelines for medical blogging?

Now with Medlogs.com and the Grand Rounds, the movement is becoming more or less organized. Everybody values their freedom of expression and that is understandable. But should we try to construct a crude framework of what is OK and what is not? It could be helpful to the new medical bloggers who are joining the field almost on a daily basis.

And the final words of wisdom are from a famous proverb, cited by Mark Jen: “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil!”


References:
Case Reports and HIPAA Rules
Google Blogoscoped
If you’ve got a story to share, check out SimplyFired.com - Mark Jen on Plaxoed.com
A little more on Mark Jen's story - Scoble
Write All About It (at Your Own Risk) - NYTimes
Writing the codes on blogs. Companies figure out what's OK, what's not in online realm - SF Gate
Compare corporate blogging guidelines on CorporateBlogging.info
Hospital Blogging Policies? The Krafty Librarian
Who’s afraid of the big, bad blog? - FT.com
Does Your Company Belong in the Blogosphere? - Harvard Business School.
Image sources: sxc.hu, See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil! - Blog.Plaxoed.com (used with permission)

Related:
When Blogging Gets You Fired. David Bradley, 2009.
On blogging. DB’s Medical Rants, 2009.
Doctors in Social Media Shouldn't Be Anonymous. 33 Charts, 2009.

Updated: 11/30/2009