Home Forums Discussions General Discussion TWITTER

A couple of weeks ago I was looking at the four icons in the lower right corner of the AC face page, and out of the blue wondered what this little bird icon could do and so I asked my now 14 year old son to help me set up a twitter account. His first response was "Dad you are not really going to tweet are you?"
After a short bit of playing around, just a few initial observations.
There is a huge twitter world out there I had no idea existed, and a lot of great stuff as it pertains to medicine.
I think setting up people or entities to follow and watching the twitter feeds come in real time from them has been incredibly helpful with expanding my knowledge base of current events. I find myself clicking on the home button between patients to keep up with great articles and other links that take you to places otherwise unexpected.
Intersecting pathways of interests outside of medicine also has been quite surprising. My daughter after a day or two said, "you think Kallan is on twitter?" Kallan happens to be her first cousin who farms north of us where my wife grew up, and we were pleasantly surprised to find an extremely elaborate twitter account that he manages, and the exchange of ideas and problem solving with primarily folks in the agriculture business has been quite interesting to observe.
Another aspect of twitter are the followers, and I am still trying to grasp how that portion of twitter functions, but will hopefully discuss this further at a later time.
Overall impression, I am having a ball with this new world (to me) I never knew existed, so just from a perspective of enhancing your knowledge base in medicine, I highly recommend giving it a go.
I apologize if most or all of this stuff is obvious to most or all others, but I had a preconceived notion twitter was something not at all like I have discovered.

Interesting. Exactly what medical information does Twiiter provide?

John,
About a month or so ago I got something in my inbox from ABIM about a new blog site, and read a blog from Marilyn Mann who is one of the Assessment 2020 task force members. I commented on her well thought out blog post at that time. Also I noticed a name on the 2020 task force committee because I read his book just a while ago and it has to be one of my best reads of all time called Cutting for Stone. So then after I got started on twitter I figured out he has a twitter site, that took me to his wonderful physical exam videos. And also a multitude of links showing his interest of integrating the exam and sanctity into the physician patient relationship. I am of the same mindset, that we under utilize the physical exam and it has been fun watching the videos and reading what he retweets.
Also Marilyn became one of my followers on twitter which really surprised and humbled me, and she has been tweeting all kinds of topics that have been extremely insightful.
So then I have picked a number of physicians, a bit random, but have found this type of interaction very intriguing.
Another follower and one I follow is Courtney Greenwood who also has a way of picking out and tweeting some really cool innovative things as it pertains to the medical field.
It is a bit hard to describe but the constant tweeter feeds as they come in through the day allow you to pick and choose the type and the depth of reading at your level of comfort.
The # thing is yet to be explored!

When it comes to social websites such as Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, et. al. always remember to never say anything you don't want in the Sunday's edition of the USA Today.

Rule of Thumb.

JamesNT

The # or Hash Tag is for steering your page and Tweets in the direction of like minded people with the same interest as well as seeking them out. You must attach it directly to a word and that word can have no breaks such as #internalmedicine. If someone does a search for internal medicine your post will be at the top of the search for a time and will eventually drop down like threads on a forum. You can also use this in your bio to lead similar people to follow you such as an Alabama Football fan putting #AlabamaFootball and #Rolltide in his bio. Beware though, you will get lots of spam if you put Doctor or Internal Medicine.

It hit me like freight train this a.m. So the idea to comment in a logical understandable way in 140 symbols or less to a retweet is the challenge of this medium. This appeals to my frugal nature. But is nigh impossible to do.
@Tom #THANKSVERYMUCH
@JamesNT #THANKSVERYMUCH

I myself have decided to start using twitter. I like the character restriction. Time is scarce, and I really would like to spend as little of it as possible to get timely updates about the things I care about.

My initial aversion to it was due to how eagerly it was embraced by people who like to blab about themselves (i.e. celebrity culture) and marketers. But screw them, I'll figure out how to use it to my own ends.

Mario,
Now that I have been doing this for a few weeks, I am an expert (ha), but you can pick and choose who you want to follow, and I think you can block people too--
So you can fine tune things, I have already un-followed a couple of folks that tweeted things not helpful and a lot of, so I think there is a degree of control of what flows to your home box.

Jimmie,
Yes, I think I'm getting the hang of it. You can follow people (and depending on their settings they may have to accept your request for this to happen), you can deny people/organization's requests to follow you, and you can definitely block people. I think there are some other features, but I haven't messed with them. I've actually had my twitter account for over a year. I had followed our local soccer team (Houston Dynamo) but upon logging in yesterday and seeing the flood of tweets they send every day, I decided to unfollow them. There isn't a tiered system (that controls the volume of messages that one receives) that I'm unaware about, is there? Like Ultra-fan, fan, casual? Where 'ultra-fan' receives tweets about what the players are having for breakfast any particular morning and 'casual' receives game scores? That would be nice.

Mario,

I am not aware of a tiered system, but I agree that would be nice. I have enjoyed this medium so far and really have been impressed with the constant stream of "customized" information coming in the home box.

John,
Just a followup on your original question, and to expand on it a bit. Dr. Verghese has a transcript of his commencement speech at Stanford he gave last weekend, which is on his site and mine, and worth reading, but in preparation for his speech he had mentioned a historical figure, Paracelsus, I had not read much about. I have been on a Paracelsus reading frenzy since, but his concept of microcosmic and macrocosmic theory got me thinking a bit more.
I suppose one could argue that I have been a bit of a cheerleader for AC of late, and I would not deny that in the least, but this whole concept of microcosmic/macrocosmic theory, if I can corrupt it a bit, may explain some of my behavior.
On a microcosmic level, integrating just 3 tools to my practice, (AC,Udpox with the portal, TV/Chromebook), has been quite transforming for my practice, and hopefully by reaching out and helping others both in the AC family and outside, I hope to restore at least some of the connectivity back to the patient that I have witnessed with the TV/Chromebook integration.
I realize many, if not most, may not even be interested in changing current "tools", but on a macrocosmic level, I think if done appropriately, the twitter medium may help in that endeavor. I am learning as I go, but hope to reach out to other physicians and if some part of my solution works for them, then that is all I can ask for.
I am not quite sure how other EHR's project on a large screen to a patient, but I do know how AC works in this fashion, and I cannot trumpet loudly enough how well this works.

I tried my first go at Vine. Unfortunately the quality is a bit wanting. I had to dropbox the video from phone to the chromebook and then record back onto phone with Vine. But for 6 second videos to post on twitter, it is straight forward, just google it. (I did not have to ask my 11 year old for help, therefore easy to do)

Getting a few more folks following, and following a few more, but the depth of information has been much more than I ever imagined.

I am hooked!

The twitter experiment has gone much better than I ever anticipated. I have been following over 70 different folks, and each morning and throughout out the day will retweet articles or information I find interesting, so I can go back and refer or even respond.
I have been quite surprised and humbled by the folks that have followed me.
Since it is a public domain, I have taken JamesNT's advice, and also have to keep it cleaned up from the not so desirable elements that do not bode well with pushing my message.
Still learning, and may consider a blog page, but still wavering on that one!

A positive for getting started with twitter.

http://health.usnews.com/health-new...patient-portals-are-changing-health-care

Wow, Jim, very cool! Congrats.

Thanks Jon!

Blogging now.
Having fun with taking pictures and tweeting messages, so continues to go very well. Don't think I will do facebook, but twitter is a keeper.
For the blogging did the wordpress.com free deal, which is not real flashy, which I like.

Now about 5 months since starting twitter. Over 100 blogs and close to 800 followers and following about 740.
Phenomenal live feed with tweets and links coming in continuously and the learning and connections have been extremely helpful
Tweetchats are still a bit tough to master but if one reads the topics beforehand, the chat makes a bit more sense than going in blind.
This medium has been a great way to introduce the concept of changing the EHR from mere documentary to an educational tool with the Chromebook TV combo.