The goal of the Healthcare industry has been to create an overall patient experience, one that gets patients to connect with doctors, to monitor their health activity at home and to be informed about their condition and needs. One-third of Americans use social media research health conditions via social media and even make decisions on their care based on that information. How is Healthcare doing at tapping into that community via social media monitoring? How can it go beyond bolstering the brand to actually improving patient care and outcomes?
Contributors

• • Christopher R. Wood, CMIO, Loyola University Health System
  • Gerry Lewis, VP of IT Strategy and Business Development, Ascension Health

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Transcript

Sanjog Aul [00:00:26]:

Hello, and, welcome to CIO Talk Radio. To learn more about the show, please visit www.ciotalkradio.com. And as always, we invite you to join the discussion on Twitter, hashtag c t r live, and look for this show as hashtag health care. How social media monitoring can improve patient care? That’s the topic for today. And our guests areGerryLewis, who’s the vice president of IT strategy and business development at Ascension Health. Hi, Gerry. How are you?

Gerry Lewis [00:00:54]:

I’m well, Sanjog Aul. How are you? Life is good? Actually, great.

Sanjog Aul [00:00:59]:

Awesome. Now we have Christopher Wood, who is the chief medical information officer with Loyola University Health System. How are you, Chris?

Christopher Wood [00:01:06]:

Good, Sanjog Aul. Thanks for having me today.

Sanjog Aul [00:01:09]:

Great. Great. Now social media, as we all see, is becoming integral to how we communicate and also learn about the world around us. So does it have any impact on how we learn about our ailments, how we select the treatment and the treatment provider? Is there an opportunity for the health care provider to listen to such social media conversation and develop strategies as well as, in some form of fashion, positively impact patient care? Please, continue to listen in as we explore these questions. So the first question goes to you, Gerry. When we look at the healthcare industry and we take pride in that industry that everything that we do has to be very predictable and it has to be well researched because the human life is at stake. Do you think this is a breath of fresh air or, inviting risk into a relatively conservative industry by inviting social media?

Gerry Lewis [00:02:07]:

Well, I think it provides a a breath of fresh air. I think social media, at least from our experience, allows us to understand the unique perspective of a patient. Really helps caregivers understand the personal side of health and well-being which extends over a larger period of time than just a sample office visit. As we look at social media, it really starts to provide some of the qualitative aspects of sickness and wellness. I mean, we’re all familiar with the pain scale. Social media from our perspective really starts to provide a way for us to measure how someone’s feeling, but also provides a compelling case for connectedness and dialogue to not only the patient, but the family caregivers and others who are in similar circumstances. So we feel that it’s a great opportunity for us to really start to broaden our ability to connect with communities, connect with our patients in a much more effective way.

Sanjog Aul [00:03:08]:

So, Chris, do you think, like, based on whatGerryjust mentioned, is it to connect? Is it to listen? Is it to find problems? If you were to take the top three intents behind inviting social media into the health care delivery, what would those be?

Christopher Wood [00:03:24]:

Yeah. I agree. I think it’s because it’s a conversation that it’s helpful. I mean, it’s really been I think a challenge for us to listen, as you say, to what all of us as individuals in the community are wanting with respect to health care. And it is helpful. It’s helpful that we get to see how people perceive us. It’s helpful for our specialists to be able to reach out and say, Did you know that we do this, that we offer this, that we can help you in this way? I think it’s helpful to be able to reach out and provide people with sound information, but also to hear some of the good information that’s out there and some of the misinformation. I think it’s also helpful to see what people are interested in and what they’re talking about. That’s fascinating. And we need to engage in that and listen to that to be better partners.

Sanjog Aul [00:04:14]:

So, Gerry, part of your title is business development, and I’m not sure what does that mean. However, would you think that there is a marketing angle to this new, inclusion of a channel where the message, of course, is heard where in terms of what the people are saying, but also as a push where you could really start saying, okay, we are better providers than the rest because it’s a competitive landscape.

Gerry Lewis [00:04:39]:

Well, absolutely. And to tag on to what Chris just said, I mean it allows us to really first of all understand, I think in much more detail and listen about particular issues that patients and communities are experiencing, but it also allows us to provide and let them know about services as Chris mentioned that we offer and do offer in treatment plans and etcetera. But I think the other part of it too is about credibility. So I think as we again engage in the conversation, it’s about credibility. And that to me is huge in terms of relating to issues, concerns and helping patients manage through particular issues.

Sanjog Aul [00:05:27]:

So, Chris, when you look at healthcare delivery, that whole process, would you see this only to be an outside peripheral source which you use at your discretion to learn and maybe inhale it? And then you have an intake session, and then you see what you can keep, what you can let go versus integrating that throughout the patient care life cycle?

Christopher Wood [00:05:56]:

I think it’s the latter. I think that but I think we’re new at it. You know, these technologies are fairly new to the industry as you mentioned in your early comments. And I think we are learning how to do it. I think another thing that is very pertinent to the discussion about how we use social media, is the discussion of how the business of medicine is changing. Right? And as we take on, for example, risk bearing contracts as an entire organization, we begin to have a financial need, not just a medical need, not just a doctor powered, nurse powered need to improve the health of our communities, which has always been there. But now we take on a business need as organizations to improve the health of communities that are out there. And I think that we are learning how to reach out with social media and begin to have that positive impact as another tool. I mean, we employ, for example, community workers that go out and meet with people in their communities, understand their lives, understand their challenges, and can help them get to doctor’s appointments and get their medicine. But to be able to reach out even further with social media, across the broad spectrum of people in our community, and help people understand what healthy behaviors are, and what they’re not. It’s just an extremely powerful tool. And we’re all learning about it. It’s an exciting time.

Gerry Lewis [00:07:23]:

Yes. And Sanjog Aul, if I could just add on to that. I would also say that healthcare is becoming much more of a consumer engagement. So how do we provide care? How do we engage? How do we ensure that folks understand how we provide healthcare at the most reasonable price? But also engaging the consumer and getting mindshare is hugely important for us and the new business models that Chris just talked about.

Sanjog Aul [00:07:51]:

While we talk about social media as a as a channel, and and, of course, you were saying that you would utilize that to even push out content to treat or not treat people, actually train people or share with them what is right versus not. Would you agree, and this is question for you, Chris, that when we look at any online resource, that’s the first easiest, most convenient resource for us to tap into to learn about it, but we still take it with a grain of salt. And then we still go to a health care provider. So do you think your knowledge being shared in online media actually undermines what people will consider as appropriate and your effort would not really yield that type of benefit that you would have otherwise expected because it is online?

Christopher Wood [00:08:38]:

I don’t think so. It’s an interesting question. I agree with you. I mean, I think that people can read something. First to go back, I think everybody, so many people are connected with social media. And for so many people, the first thing they do every day, and as they read through, then they’ll see this article and that article. And I agree. I think that people do tend to look at postings that come out of health care organizations broadly as something that they could trust in, if they went and read about it. The question is, are they interested? Is it a topic that they care about? And we’re finding through our monitoring of our use of social media, what are the things that people do come to our website or to our electronic newsletters to find more about? What is successful there versus what are things that people really aren’t interested about? So I don’t think we are losing trust by being out there. I think we need to be part of the conversation. But asGerrysaid earlier, we need to be authentic in what we are saying, and not try to put a whole bunch of marketing that feels like marketing out there. The more true we can be to who we are and what we do and what’s good for you as a member of our community, I think the better experience people will have with us.

Sanjog Aul [00:10:05]:

Now, Gerry, if you were to look at the way you approach this whole social media or including social media into your approach to how you do an outreach, how do you take that input from social media and bring it into a meaningful, actionable, analytics or items that you will put into place. What does that look like? Is that something which is similar to any other type of listening we have been doing over the years, through other channels, like surveys and others. Is that similar to it?

Gerry Lewis [00:10:38]:

Well, I would say no. It’s not similar to what we’ve done in the past because the conversations can vary so greatly. And so that I think is as we look at social media, the conversations are across varied topics. I think the messaging and the actions, we try to listen not only to patients, but as Chris said, industry experts and policymakers all in the interest of providing more informed care, for the patients and the communities that we’re privileged to serve. So we believe that social media starts to provide us with reliable and actual insights simply because it empowers those to use it to provide the ability to have feedback, generate dialogue and be better informed, on particular issues that are very relevant to them. So, in terms of analytics, we’re, again, as Chris mentioned earlier, we’re still scratching the surface in terms of how we’re starting to look at those and how we want to respond to those. But the challenge we have here, it’s not just taking a predefined survey, it’s just the variability of the landscape that we’re dealing with is something that we’re still, again, trying to make sure that we are looking at those and we have appropriate actions to manage the conversations that we are engaged with.

Christopher Wood [00:12:05]:

Sanjog Aul, if I could add on to whatGerryis saying there just a little bit. I think that one of the things about social media commentary that is different from a survey is that people realize when they are taking a survey that they are giving feedback to the surveyors. When they are talking on social media, in large part, they are talking to their friends, or to their family. And so it’s a different type of, maybe a different depth of feedback that we are getting. And if we can listen to that in structured ways, we can really learn about what people think about their health, what’s important, what they think about us, our service, our offerings and in ways that are different than we could learn from a survey.

Sanjog Aul [00:12:54]:

Now would you say and to your point, Chris, if you are thinking that there will be people talking to their relatives, do you think the level of openness you would expect from anyone, including yourself and I, talking about an ailment, which we may have or we think we may have, would we be that open? And in case we are open, they are talking about that, I’m assuming, in a private channel versus telling my grandma that I’ve got this issue on Facebook and openly. Well how will you get access is what the question is.

Christopher Wood [00:13:27]:

Yeah. This is well, access to that is interesting. I don’t think healthcare organizations, in general, are sophisticated to the point where they’re actively looking for what people are saying back and forth through public channels to their family members. I’m talking more about comments that they might make on a post that we have put out. But it is true. It’s surprising how relaxed we are as a society with our private information in these public settings. I’m also a physician, and I have friends who have posted, not private messaged me, but posted to my Facebook page pictures of themselves with health care questions. I quickly give them a call and say, hey, you might want to take that down. I mean, it’s fine if you want to share, but you need to understand I can’t respond to that legally. So we have to educate people about what is appropriate to share. But people are much more willing to share what’s going on in their lives and ask questions in these public methods than you would have assumed 15 years ago before this all started?

Gerry Lewis [00:14:41]:

Yes. We’ve seen the exact same thing. People are much more open on these types of channels than we would have expected. And Chris is absolutely right. We’ve seen the same kind of posts; they share very personal information in a very public forum, and that sometimes they might not say face to face. So interesting phenomenon.

Sanjog Aul [00:15:04]:

Let’s take a quick break, listeners. We’ll be right back. And, Gerry, I come back to you and let’s see if you have two or three or four items that you with your effort into getting some information out of social media has given the insights which you would have otherwise not gathered or garnered from other sources. Please stay tuned listeners. We’ll be right back and explore.

Sanjog Aul [00:17:42]:

Welcome back. So, Gerry, see if you could share a few examples of the type of insights we could get from social media or or you or your organization or others that you know have been able to gather, which otherwise was not coming through or not you’re not able to get from other channels.

Gerry Lewis [00:17:59]:

Well, I think a couple of things. You know, one of the things that we’re able to do here more real time is really measure the voice of the customer and really sentiment about how they feel about either service that we have provided very well or service that we have not provided to meet their needs. We mentioned earlier that we measure trends, influencers and how do we reach what’s our reach look like? And so one of the things that we’ve been able to do with this, a couple of point examples are to really look at where service is going on real time that we’ve had challenges with and people start either tweeting or putting stuff out on social media to help us alert us to their displeasure. And so we’ve been able to look at that, and we’re starting to react more quickly so we can address some of those, not exactly real time but soon after so we can do service recoveries very much more quickly versus looking at something that was that an outcome that was not as anticipated a month into arrears. So we can actually do much more, be much more active in engaging and looking at stories that are coming out of social media and how do we start to either engage in the conversation, prepare for a conversation with patients, much more effectively than we have been able to do in the past?

Sanjog Aul [00:19:32]:

So, Chris, when you look at your world and you have come in with a specific role, which may be more internal processes, at least from the title, it seems like. But do you see, an inclusion of social media related information and data that is getting collected and utilized and integrated in your process optimization and better patient care and better information management?

Christopher Wood [00:20:00]:

Well, in my role as a CMIO, and I think this is probably true for all CMIOs, the work we need to do is exactly along the lines of your questioning. Because it’s not just about our customers, the CMIO’s customer isn’t just the internal clinician or the internal clinical business leader anymore. The customer really is all of the people that might access information systems at the healthcare organization. And most of that access, turns out, for information anyway, comes from patients. And so we do need to be aware of that, and planning for it, and making sure that we are providing the services that we need, and also that we are learning in the ways that we need to. It’s surprising. To go back to the question that you asked Gerry, some of the things that we learn from monitoring how people access our systems are very interesting and helpful to us. We do know, for example, that people do like to hear seasonal related health issues. For example, we had an article for our patients that was on our website, that’s about why do you crave sweet things. And it kind of came out in the fall when we all start to crave sweet things a little bit more. And as a physician, you might say, well, people will probably like that. But turning to the statistics of how many times people do open that tells us that they do go for it. And they do want to learn about that. They want to learn about how to exercise, and how to safely lose weight. And you can see that by how people access your information and how they share it. Other interesting insights are things like, you know, what time of year are people accessing. Fall and spring for us are times when people access our media more. We find things that we didn’t expect, like that our most popular article in 2014 that people turned to was an article that actually came out of 2012. And it’s just one of those things that it’s popular in the social networks. It’s something that’s kind of unique, and that people don’t find a lot of other areas where they can access that information. So when they see it, they tend to share it. And that provides insights, both as to what does become popular, what goes viral on the outside. And it also can help us learn on the inside that social media isn’t something we entirely plan. It’s organic. People, you know, you are putting this out there and the community is going to take it and run with it, or they are going to ignore it based on its quality. So we have this opportunity to learn.

Sanjog Aul [00:22:58]:

Gerry, when you look at the different things that we are learning and, of course, we want to invite social media, there is supposed to be some dedicated efforts, some resources applied, some funding required to do this, or do you think, hey. This is just another thing we’re gonna include in the way we learn about the world outside of us. Is it strategic? Is it a separate project, or you’re just kind of toying with it and you have some play money for trying it and when you see some successes, that’s when people will get serious about it?

Gerry Lewis [00:23:31]:

We see this as a strategic imperative for us. I mentioned consumerism earlier. We think that’s going to be a key opportunity for us to engage in the consumerism of healthcare as the business models continue to change. So it’s not part time people. I mean, we actually have a very specific digital strategy. We’ve got expertise, both from the IT side, but also from the communication side, looking, managing, having very specific responsibilities of which to continue to enhance our presence in the social media aspect of this component of our business. We see this as a huge opportunity for us to continue to use information to better improve our services. I mean, social insights seem, and again, they’re real time mostly, they’re unbiased, and you have to be ready to manage the negative components of this. So we think it’s strategic. We’ve invested. We will continue to invest in it because we think this is the direction, that will aid us just from an overall care perspective.

Sanjog Aul [00:24:55]:

Now when we look at the measurement and the effectiveness of whatever we are trying is working, Chris, whatever level of investment that may have been made and whatever listening and corresponding actions that you may have taken? Have they been able to show results so that you can be positive and continue to build upon?

Christopher Wood [00:25:17]:

Well, I think that’s as far as like patient outcomes the patient would care about, I think that’s what we need to build towards in our use of social media. The types of statistics that these systems are sort of built up to get us so far really have to do with the front end statistics. How many people are clicking on it? How many people are seeing a Facebook post? How many people are sharing that Facebook post? How many people are coming to a newsletter? Things like that. And so that’s the type of information that’s more ready to get. It’s easy to get. The industries that have been built up around the Internet make it easy to get that. I think as we think strategically going into the future, we have to think about how can we use social media as a partnering tool. One of the things we learned, for example, from the statistics that we currently have, is that in some cases, the majority of the page touches we get come from mobile devices. And we know from other research that is available that people in our communities, many of which are financially challenged, have access to mobile devices. And so we have to begin to think strategically. How can we reach out with more specific health messages, or ease of use messages even? How do you get to your pharmacist? Did you know about this program that can help you? Did you know about this service that we have? How can we get those messages out to the right people in the way that they want to get this information? And then to begin to measure on the backside, what effect did that have? Did people start to call their healthcare workers more frequently? Did they come in for a screening exam more frequently? We do pay attention to those trends, but I think connecting the two is something we need to do better as an industry.

Sanjog Aul [00:27:19]:

Gerry, would you think the intent here will be care driven or dollar driven with respect to social media getting included?

Gerry Lewis [00:27:31]:

I think it’s going to be both. I think as the healthcare business models change, one of the things that we’re going to have to make sure that we do is we’re going to have to ensure that we have the appropriate levels of engagement. And that could be multiple channels. That could be social media, that, as you stated earlier, which we’ve also found, that could be via mobile solutions, phone calls, people showing up. So we have to engage in all those, but clearly, to provide care management. And that’s typically, care management for us is outside of the facilities. How do we show up and go to and be present to those particular links that you’re engaged with? And I think that’s the challenge that we have. And we see social media as one of those channels for us to effectively engage, share, and manage the consumer relationship and care relationship. Clearly as we move to much more of a risk based model, we want to actively be engaged throughout the continuum of the patients that we serve in our communities, much more effectively than, you get admitted, you get discharged. And by the way, we’ve also used social media to improve those particular processes because people were frustrated with how long it took to get registered into one of our facilities. And then also we continue to enhance the discharge processes so we keep that engagement and those touch points with patients, in a way that makes sense for them. So they understand that.

Sanjog Aul [00:29:15]:

Let’s take a quick break. Let’s just we’ll be right back and see in what always of course, and there was an example just shared by,Gerryon the workflow side where people were not able to get registered. And, also, if there is any impact possible on the clinical side that is the actual curing of a disease that patient expects when they come to a health care, organization. To what all degree which we, you know, we see it can impact the delivery side, which is the health care delivery, the whole workflow, and also the clinical side. So let’s explore this more when we come back. Please stay tuned.

Sanjog Aul [00:31:50]:

Welcome back. So, Chris, let’s look at the way we would see the impact of using social media on health care works like, delivery workflow, which is more the process of how you go about in, you know, registering a patient, etcetera, compared to the actual clinical side where they are being treated. Do you see impact even trickling to the treatment side as well?

Christopher Wood [00:32:18]:

Yeah. We do see that beginning to happen. And the way that it happens and as we learn what are the right ways to reach out to people electronically, it’s not always through social media. But for example, when flu season comes around and we begin to want to educate people about the benefits and the risks of the flu shot this year, it’s easier with social media to direct people to a workflow process where they could find out where they get a flu shot, or sign up to come in and get a flu shot. So there are certainly those sort of workflow related things that are easier to do. I think on the clinical side, being able to direct people in the same way, and then inviting them through social media to make that connection, to make that contact, is something we haven’t been able to do. So it’s not just about having an article anymore. You can actually provide a link where people can begin to take an action. Whether it’s signing up for a health care class, or a weight loss class, or just understanding. One of our most popular articles had to do with not wanting to, not needing to live with double vision, or with an eye that wanders. And, you can learn about that. And the information can spread through social media. But the connection then is back to a service and a physician who can help, at our organization. So I’m not sure if that’s what you were looking for in that question. But those are the types of things we’re already seeing. And I think as we move forward, we can begin to become more strategic about when we sit in our groups and say, how do we help people take better care of their diabetes? I think that one of the check boxes we’ll have on our list of things to think through is, how do we reach out to social media and have that impact?

Sanjog Aul [00:34:17]:

So, Gerry, what would you like to see identified or through the social media inclusion? What are all things you would like to see be able to identify and or listen through so that it can actually help you increase the amount of impact you’re able to make today?

Gerry Lewis [00:34:33]:

Well, a couple of things. One of the things that I think will also help on the clinical side is as we see these online communities and support groups really start to get established is how do we engage in that from a provider perspective and start to provide levels of content to help them understand treatment opportunities, discuss the particular areas and more for going from general to much more concise terms. And then how do we engage them for some of the next steps and or protocols that would need to take place. So I think it’s expanding the reach there. And as we look at the environment, obviously, we continue to get more folks joining. So managing the analytics, I think, and the tools as they become much more robust in the engagement, I think, how do we take this from a social media contact to really moving that to much more of a telemedicine contact, if you will, and what are those workflows start to look like just from an overall care perspective?

Sanjog Aul [00:35:56]:

Chris, when you look at the compliance with respect to privacy and otherwise it’s a heavily regulated industry anyways, the devil is in the execution in many cases. Do you think that’s coming to prevent or is it undermining in any way the overall potential that you could otherwise harness from social media?

Christopher Wood [00:36:17]:

I don’t think so. I think it is important for us to be very cautious with personally identifiable, protected health information. And clearly, one of the things that we reach out to teach medical students, at Loyola we have a lot of medical students, we have a lot of residents coming from all over the world to learn here. And one of the things we have to teach them quickly is what they can and can’t share, and what is appropriate. But I don’t think that holds us back from properly using social media. I think social media from a healthcare organization perspective does need to be much more focused on what is important, on clearing up, or at least participating in the national discussion about what is healthy and what is not healthy. What are the right things to do? Sometimes we’ll see a trend come through. And maybe I’ll talk about a trend that was a little older, like the protein based Atkins diets that were so popular several years ago. With social media we can see the impact of those trends. Maybe not quantitatively yet, but qualitatively we can see the impact of those trends, like the gluten free diet. And we can have our dietitian experts or our gastrointestinal experts chime into that conversation through social media by putting out information. So I don’t think it hampers us. I think it’s doing the right thing. We can use we do have a patient portal that is password protected, and the information that we send back and forth is encrypted, and it’s secure. And those are the right places to have those personal electronic discussions between patient and physician. So we work really hard to educate our patients, and to educate our medical students as they’re coming in, to what our physicians know. That there’s right places to have those personal discussions, and there’s great places to have those general topic discussions.

Sanjog Aul [00:38:26]:

Now, Gerry, when you look at the regulations, since you may be already into trying social media and, of course, trying to maximize the potential, do you see anything that we should do to the regulation in order for you to be able to maximize what can be achieved through social media?

Gerry Lewis [00:38:45]:

Well, I agree with what Chris just said. It’s the how do you ensure that the appropriate communications and conversations are going on in the right channels. And so, obviously, since this is a very open channel, you can choose what information you want to share. And what we try to do is ensure that as people post that we try to inform consumers and patients and our communities that obviously this information is protected. But I think one of the things that again, it’s the right channel for the right conversations. And I think that’s so very important. And I think as we look at this, one of the things I think is going to happen is I think some of the regulatory bodies are going to have to start to look at how care is delivered and start to expand those definitions because in some states that we have care delivery organizations, it’s pretty restrictive still. So and that goes both to care and to a cost perspective because there are a lot of things that we can continue to move forward with. But if you look at the business model, it doesn’t support that. So I think they have to be hand in hand from a regulatory perspective moving forward because we think that there’s value in there for both the consumer and the healthcare provider in terms of starting to bend the cost curve as well as the care outcome curve.

Christopher Wood [00:40:25]:

You know, if I could add a little bit on, I’m just thinking a little bit more about this topic. I think it’s really important. I think it’s a great question you’re asking, Sanjog Aul. Because there’s confusion, I think, within the healthcare industry in general. And this is in the Western part of the United States, as well as here in the Midwest, as I come here and see this, where within the clinical business realms, people are concerned about sharing information that is completely appropriate for them to share. What I mean is, if they have information about a patient, and that patient goes to a different doctor, that new doctor would like to have all of that information that we have. And it’s completely appropriate for us to share that information. Sometimes you’ll get a position that misunderstands that the HIPAA laws actually protect the sharing of that information, and make it so that we can do that. Right? And that we want to do that. Now we still have to keep an audit trail of who we share the information with, if a patient ever wants to come back. And that adds administrative burden that I think is unintended. You know, keeping a list of who saw every piece of information ever does add some technical and administrative burden and cost to the health care industry that maybe wasn’t intended. So I think people who make policy need to recognize and think through the unintended consequences of the policy. The other thing I think is really interesting is the HIPAA laws protect the sharing of information for the transaction of the clinical business. So what does that mean when we talk about the transactions of the clinical business being healthcare related? An example would be being able to share what if a patient wants to share their family history data with their social network? Certainly patients are able to do that now. They can just put on their Facebook page, here is my family tree, and here is everyone who had cancer, if they wanted to do that. But what if healthcare organizations found that it was useful to the practice of medicine to encourage that type of behavior. Well, we would really have to think through the regulations of how that information might be able to be shared, and how it wouldn’t be able to be shared. And my sense is that it would be fairly cumbersome considering the current clarification of the laws.

Sanjog Aul [00:42:47]:

Now, if you were to look at the situation where the health care providers or, say, doctors, they want to be out there on their own and speaking about something. And if they are self motivated, that’s awesome. They’re helping out. But at the same time, as an organization, you want to have a select few who are PR trained, and that’s, of course, a reality so that they don’t cause more damage than good. How do you control this ecosystem, in a form and create a controlled freedom, if you will, of expression? Can you create, and this is for you, Gerry, so that we are able to have the people be themselves as they are sharing what they want to share? But at the same time, there is an alignment to what a health care organization wants to see discussed in the open forum in social media.

Gerry Lewis [00:43:37]:

Yeah. We tried actually, what we’re doing is we’ve created a certification program for our social media practitioners, if you will. Basically about the policies and procedures, some of the do’s and don’ts and really how to effectively engage in these social conversations. And what are those best practices, in terms of integrating social media efforts, data into clinical systems, events and such so that we look at the whole ecosystem, if you will. Because we definitely, providers on their own will engage, which is wonderful. But we want to make sure that we’ve got some guardrails so that they can be out there impacting and discussing, but also just to understand some of the guardrails that are out there. And then how do we look at the entire context from the social media side? And then as we transition to what that private clinical looks like, what’s the appropriate way and appropriate venues and conversations that should be had on both those particular channels. So we’re trying to make sure that we’re not overly prescriptive, but we put a framework in place to effectively manage within those particular environments.

Sanjog Aul [00:44:56]:

Would you say those are loose guidelines or are they very stringent because compliance is involved here?

Gerry Lewis [00:45:00]:

Well, I think since this is a growing market, they’re fairly loose, at least on the social media side. Obviously, from a regulatory perspective, on the clinical side, they’re very stringent. And I think the transition between the two is something that we’re still learning and understanding and getting experience with. So I think that continues to evolve as we get better and smarter about our approaches in social media from a clinical perspective.

Sanjog Aul [00:45:30]:

Let’s take a quick break, listeners. We’ll be right back. And Chris would love to talk about the areas where the patients who are seeing health care providers and their representatives, essentially doctors or whosoever is imparting the education, are there, and they are maybe, imparting knowledge just for the sake of imparting knowledge, or there could be a marketing bent. How is that being perceived by the patients? And is that a turnoff, or is it actually helping the organization in the very cause which had them go in this direction? Please stay tuned listeners. We’ll be right back and explore.

Sanjog Aul [00:48:01]:

Welcome back. So, Chris, people love to buy, but they hate to be sold. And while we are not trying to sell there, but if they get a whiff of that, it’s gonna be turned off and it could do more damage to your PR or people will silently start building a distaste. And that could bring your social media down. How do you control that? And how do you manage it?

Christopher Wood [00:48:25]:

Well, I think that for those that are listening out there, I think you’re absolutely right on. We all have that social media friend who is just posting in a way that’s annoying. And I think that’s the whole reason that Facebook has an unfollow. I can still be your friend. If they check and see I’m still your friend, but I’m not following you anymore, they can’t see that I’m not following you anymore. And as a healthcare organization, you don’t want to be unfollowed. Right? And I think that if organizations are just marketing, putting up, hey, we are here for you. The world is sunshine-y and it’s because of us. That’s not going to work for you. I think what we have found to be successful at Loyola is just telling people what we really deeply care about. Here are physicians and the services that they offer. Not as a means we are not saying, please come in and get this service. Everyone needs a hip replacement. That’s not what we are saying. But we are saying, we have this doctor. He is concerned about this particular issue. He has done research on it. Here is his research. And this doctor works here at Loyola. I think the subtlety of that is something that people understand that we are trying to say. We are proud of who we are. We are proud of what we do. We are proud of what we can offer the community. When we have more general topics, the message needs to be more about the patient, more about the consumer, and more about the information, and much less about the healthcare organization. So that people can begin to trust it. If people trust the information, then they’ll come back to you again and again. And we see that growth happening in our usage of social media, our patients and the people in the community, how they use our social media. So we feel confident that we’re doing the right thing. But I think organizations have to monitor that. They have to know, are they being followed or are they being unfollowed?

Sanjog Aul [00:50:29]:

Gerry, do you have any safeguards against this pitching, if you will?

Gerry Lewis [00:50:36]:

Well, we have, just like other digital businesses, we’ve got content guidelines and we’ve got particular forums and reviewers that monitor this. But you don’t really want to be onerous in terms of how that information is delivered or what kind of information is delivered. So it’s something that we evaluate and again continue to evolve how we manage content because that’s the key lifeblood as Chris was talking about to having engagement and having folks continue to follow you going forward.

Sanjog Aul [00:51:28]:

Now Chris, when we come back to you, we would like to see if you as a new leader in this organization, and I’m assuming that while this may not be your main responsibility, but you may have an influence in terms of how this shapes up. What are your thoughts about making this mainstream?

Christopher Wood [00:51:46]:

About making social media mainstream?

Sanjog Aul [00:51:48]:

Yes, social media mainstream in the very healthcare and patient care delivery.

Christopher Wood [00:51:54]:

I think that it’s interesting. And are you talking about interacting with having our physicians accept us or having patients accept it or just all of that?

Sanjog Aul [00:52:05]:

So you have a role, and you will be one of the contributors towards the strategic input that may be required to put the foundation in place. That’s the assumption here. And if that’s the case, then what do you think would be, your contribution in the role that you are in to make sure that social media is exploited to its best and its values harnessed?

Christopher Wood [00:52:27]:

I see. Yeah. I find myself in strategic conversations all the time about both within my own area of information systems and what we’re going to do to reach out to patients better. And I think as a leader in that area, you need to be one who can bring understanding of the appropriateness and the power of social media to a given application. And we need, our organizations need to hear over and over again, that this is a useful thing. It’s a powerful thing. And in what ways is it powerful? In what ways is it dangerous? Because there is a lot of misconceptions in the general medical population, in the general healthcare organization population, about the utility and the benefits of social media. And I think you just have to be a voice at every level. Stepping outside of just information systems, and thinking about projects that other people in my organization are involved with, when they are scratching their heads saying, I wonder how we can get this information out to the public. Being a reasonable voice, and being able to come back and say, that might be a great thing for an electronic newsletter. Or that’s something that we should put on our patient portal, and message our direct patients, those that have signed up with us. Or really, that’s something that should go out as an e-newsletter, but also with links to it from Twitter and from Facebook, so that lots of people can get in touch with that. I think it’s our role and responsibility to be active proponents, people that are pushing social media usage in the right ways, and educating our colleagues about the uses, the benefits, and also the drawbacks. When they hear that you understand what the drawbacks are, they can begin to trust your opinion more.

Sanjog Aul [00:54:23]:

Now, Gerry, one last question for you is that if you are going to since you are, of course, this whole initiative is underway and you are leading it from your standpoint, what specific people, tools, and processes have you put in place which with an intention that this will really, take shape in the manner that you expected? And what are the lessons learned through like all along in this journey, at least so far?

Gerry Lewis [00:54:50]:

Well, in terms of people, tools and processes, I think a few things. One is that we understand that it’s a strategic one of the strategic initiatives that we have as an organization. If you look at just the rise in social media just from a healthcare perspective over the last 2 years, it’s been fairly significant. So, obviously, we’ve created a team, a dedicated team to really manage digital media. We’re looking at improving how we communicate in terms of how we engage in conversations across our facilities and our communities that we serve. So, how do we ensure that we’ve got valid, good information to continue to engage, which has been a challenge in the past because we’ve had inconsistent use and capabilities. So how do we make those much more consistent? How do we ensure that we’ve got the right information that the communities are asking for and, again, will value? And so then, it’s ensuring that we’ve got information and we’re providing it in the appropriate channels and that we’re monitoring it so that we can continue to use this information to get better, to learn, to provide better services than maybe areas where we’re missing the mark in terms of either the service itself and or how we provide the service in a particular instance. And starting to provide then how we want to look at this from just an identity perspective. How do we want to use more of our brand identity to continue to move this channel along to continue to envelop the conversations and obviously make them go deeper because it has value to the communities of which we’re serving.

Sanjog Aul [00:56:50]:

On behalf of the show and our listeners, I’d really like to thank you both for sharing your thoughts on how social media can actually help patient care and overall healthcare delivery.

Christopher Wood [00:57:01]:

Thanks so much for having us, Sanjog Aul.

Gerry Lewis [00:57:03]:

Thank you so much, Sanjog Aul.

Sanjog Aul [00:57:05]:

Thank you again. And, listeners, hope you enjoyed the conversations, got a few nuggets out of it. Please like us on Facebook, search for CIO Talk Radio, and be sure to follow us on Twitter. Thank you again for listening to CIO Talk Radio. This is Sanjog Aul, your talk show host. Till next week, take care, and God bless.