Healthcare And Social Media?

One of our Founders, Dr. Jude Pierre, had the privilege of speaking at the National Quality Forum (NQF) the other week on standardizing medications review and management. Among the other things talked about at the conference he mentioned to me about some organizations wanting to mix Healthcare with Social Media. Off the bat I said “That will never happen!” Think about it, would you want others knowing about your health status? But, you have to keep in mind your elders. They are now starting to use devices such as Life Alert to alert family, friends, and a dispatch service of any emergency health situations with the push of a button. Let’s transition this to being able to publish the alert through Facebook and/or Twitter. Of course this would be tailored to only alert the individuals you wish to and not the entire population of followers and friends.

Let’s focus on how this can help individuals. Imagine your brother has diabetes and has to take insulin to keep his blood sugar levels down. Part of this routine is to take a blood glucose reading every 6 hours with a glucometer. This glucometer is equipped with Bluetooth and can send results to your phone and apps on the phone can then transmit that data to your Facebook or Twitter account so that only select individuals can see the results. As expected your brother takes a reading every 6 hours, today you noticed it’s been 12 hours since he’s taken a reading. Is it a time to worry? Well if you see no other posts on his Facebook account, perhaps it’s time to give him a call...