Nebraska AFP Meeting

Thanks again to my new friends at the Nebraska Academy of Family Physicians meeting for the invitation to speak at their Annual Meeting about the topic of Social Media and Family Medicine. I've been doing these type of talks for Family Docs from coast to coast for about 2 years now, and I'm happy to report that I'm seeing less and less clueless looks from the audience.​

The Family Medicine community, through the education efforts of many of my friends from #FMRevolution, is starting to come around as far as recognizing the importance of social media for patient education, marketing, and advocacy.​

I intentionally did not tweet a lot or use facebook that much during sessions, because I found myself in a lot of "sidebar" conversations with people I sat next to. I made a lot of new Nebraska friends at the meeting, and I caught up with long time Family Medicine friends.

The strength of "in person" meetings is still the "in person" part. Already on twitter, just this weekend, I'm seeing Family Medicine meetings in Nebraska, Michigan, New Hampshire, Oregon, and, of course, Ohio.

I encourage my #FMRevolution friends to not only use social media this weekend, but don't forget to make those more important "in person" connections as well. We WILL spread the Family Medicine Revolution: One person at a time...

The Golden Rule Of Traveling

I'm on my way to speak at the Nebraska Academy of Family Physicians meeting about Social Media and Medicine. Unfortunately, Mother Nature got in the way yesterday with lots of volatile storms in my travel path, causing the delay and the canceling of flights across the country (including my flights).

Traveling is definitely an exercise in patience, especially with the gate agents who have to rebook your flight. I mean, hey, it's not their fault about plane mechanical problems and about bad weather in your region. Give them a break people! If you treat them with respect, you will receive that in return (and it doesn't hurt to share that on social media)

Which got me thinking: this is a great analogy for work and for life. I remember when I was a medical student and as a Family Medicine Intern/Resident. One of the top pieces of advice what this: Treat the nurses extra nice, and you'll be pleasantly surprised with the results.​

During your intern year, there are times when you feel like a very clueless new doctor. People are turning to you for answers, and you may not have them. Sometimes the intern, in a moment of stress (which happens often), turns to the medical student to ask a question or to confirm a thought. ​

It is moments like this when nursing staff can really save you. When you're a new doctor, there is nothing like turning to experienced individuals to help you learn - whether a senior resident physician, an attending physician, or a long time nurse. And if you treat your colleagues with respect, especially nursing staff, you will be surprised with how much people go "above and beyond" to help you out. This happens at work and this happens in life as well.

Today, I'm starting this traveling exercise all over again. In checking The Weather Channel, severe storms are expected again today. And, when I finally get to Omaha, I'm expecting a 30 degree temperature drop from where I'm sitting right now, and snow (yes snow still in April). Keep track of my travels on twitter, and wish me luck!

Has Twitter Changed? Previewing FamMedRocks Ep300

​Remember when twitter was a great place to have conversations? I invite you to join me on Thursday, April 4, 2013 at 12pm Eastern Time for Family Medicine Rocks Podcast Episode 300. My guest will be Meredith Gould: Digital Strategist, Writer, Blogger, and Founder of the Church Social Media Chat (#ChSocM).

​This landmark show was sparked by the Meredith's tweet above about two weeks ago: "Ah Twitter. I remember when public convo offered rich engagement among tweps wrestling with great questions. Now I get that via DM."

​I wholeheartedly agree with this statement. I've been active on social media since 2006 (has it been that long already?), and I remember a time when blog posts regularly received dozens of comments back and forth. Then, when twitter first started, there were these great spontaneous group type discussions out there on topics. Scheduled twitter chats have kind of replaced that, but chats are structured, and leave little room for tangential/sidebar discussions.

When people now want to have a little bit deeper discussion, I receive the twitter/facebook direct message. People send me an e-mail, or even a text to my phone - and the conversation takes place off the "public" airwaves. But why?​

​In my opinion, here are reasons why "rich engagement" has gone private:

Political Correctness prevents deep analysis: We live in a world where people focus more on being offended ​than expressing a fully thought out opinion. Sometimes truth hurts, but people hesitate to go there in the public forum, because of the fear of being labelled a "hater." So, the discussion shifts to private messages.

This hyper-partisian world leaves little room for the "middle of the road" opinion: No matter what public opinion you express, whether it is on gay marriage or who will win the Final Four, people will attempt to paint you as some kind of extremist. How has the world evolved to this? No wonder people shift to the private message.

Being taken "out of context" is no longer the exception, it is the rule: ​This kind of goes along with the reasons above. To negate your argument or to deflate your point of view, people don't take all of your statements head-on, they are selective in the arguments they make. People pick out the statements they can easily defeat or label as "extreme" and then they reason the entire opinion is null and void. 

I hope that even some of this makes sense. I'm looking forward to my live conversation with Meredith Gould on Thursday, April 4, 2013 at 12pm Eastern Time on Family Medicine Rocks Podcast Episode 300. Hope you can join us!

Previewing AAFP NCSC 2013

​Family Medicine leadership is very important to me, as I have talked about on this website in the past. Later this month will be one of the most important Fam Med leadership meetings of the entire year: The National Conference of Special Constituencies organized by the American Academy of Family Physicians. This meeting will take place from April 25-27, 2013 in Kansas City.

In the videos below, you'll see exciting and fun promotions for this year's meeting. Unfortunately, I will be unable to attend this year, but I know that I'll be able to share in the action through the (probable) twitter hashtag #aafpncsc. Shout out to all my friends headed out to NCSC 2013!

Andy Ihnatko: "I'm A Narcissist In Private" HA!

Andy Ihnatko is a tech journalist who is a writer for the Chicago Sun-Times and co-host of the MacBreak Weekly podcast. The interview above is a type of "up close and personal" chat that is an interesting comparison of a person's public persona versus the person behind the mask.

When I started in social media, it was important for me to be anonymous. But, then I realized that to make more of an impact, I had to be non-anonymous. In watching this interview above, I have learned that you can actually keep some things private, and there are ways to do that.​

One of the cool things about Andy is that he's a guy who has done a lot of deep thinking about a lot of things, and that is apparent in the interview above when it comes to technology, staying private in social media, and being a writer.​

I have always admired good writers, because of why they are good writers. Good writers are able to describe their point of view and opinion in ways that everyone can understand. Effective ways to communicate has always been fascinating to me.​

The funniest quote in the interview was having to do with not exposing your entire life to social media. It's been talked about in the past that a lot of people in social media (including me) has to be a little bit of a narcissist to talk about things like what you had for breakfast. In the quote above, Andy does admit to be a narcissist, but only in private (around 28 minutes into the interview)​

I apologize if this post seems boring, but I've been trying to get back into the habit of blog writing again. I remember when ​I started blogging. i wrote pretty much everyday. And it took me a while to get into a groove, and eventually, my writing became actually decent. Hopefully, I'll get there again. I just have to get back writing on a regular basis again...

Did Eric Topol Jump The Shark?

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​Is it the goal of social media docs to go mainstream? On twitter yesterday and today, I kept seeing posts that rockstar Dr. Eric Topol from Scripps Health was going to be a guest on the Colbert Report. At first, I thought, "Well, that's cool." Then as I continued to think about it, I asked, "Will this appearance really move the needle at all? Did Eric Topol jump the shark?"

All the time, I get questions from docs starting out in social media, "Hey, Mike, how can I get more twitter followers? How can I get more people to visit my website? Do you know anyone in national TV to help get the word out about me?" Is getting popular to just get popular a real goal? That's not medicine. That's not making a difference for patients. That's celebrity.​

​Now, don't get me wrong. I'm probably going to sound like a hypocrite here, but I think what Eric Topol is doing is great, and, of course, I would not turn down an invite on Colbert (not that I would ever get that opportunity).

But, for docs doing social media or who want to do social media, I remind you to not to get caught up in getting famous or being a celebrity. It won't happen overnight. Topol has been doing this type of education & media for a long time, and he deserves all the success he has. But for those of us who are not him, I remind you to remember what's  professionally important, and that's your patients. Focus on that and however you define success will be right around the corner.​

Thanks to Hover & Squarespace

So, I've been in the midst of changing over my domain name company to Hover.com from this other company. And. man, it's been tough to do this thing myself. Sheesh.​

Just wanted to give a big shout out both to Squarespace and to Hover customer service for tolerating my questions about how to switch domain companies and now to link to this Squarespace blog. I'll be changing over more domains to Hover. Thanks Squarespace & Hover!​

FamMedRocks Google Hangout

​So, if you know me, you know I'm not afraid to fail. HA! I've never done a Google Hangout, until tonight! I will be joined by my pals and Family Physicians - Dr. Gerry Tolbert and Dr. Kim Yu. We're going to have a discussion on a variety of topics including the following:

1. Why Family Medicine Needs To Embrace Social Media
2. ​Today's Politico Health Care Event talking about Scope of Practice
3. ​Last week's Match Day 2013 Results and What It Means
4. The recent broadcasts of the Escape Fire film on CNN
5. Whatever else comes up

Factoring in technical difficulties, the Family Medicine Rocks Google Hangout should be up and running around 9pm Eastern Time at this link. Don't worry, I'll record the thing and make it available on my youtube page.

Yes, it would be helpful if you're already on Google+ so that you have the ability to leave comments and make fun of us. If this works, then I may have other Google Hangouts on Family Medicine and Primary Care topics. We'll see what happens!​

Politico: Health Care Scope Of Practice Event

Politico will be holding a Health Care Breakfast Briefing tomorrow, March 19, 2013 beginning at 8am Eastern TIme. The topic will be "Defining The Scope Of Practice." You can watch the free live video stream at this link.

The panelists include the following:​ Wanda Filer, MD (AAFP Board of Directors), Angela Golden, DNP (President of American Association of Nurse Practitioners), and Donna Shalala (former secretary of HHS).

There will definitely be verbal fireworks between the AAFP and the AANP representatives that started with the AAFP Report "Primary Care For the 21st Century" stating that Independent Practice NPs "threatens to splinter care and undermine PCMH." Of course, the AANP disagreed with this report and released their own statement. There have been other opinions about this disagreement on Modern Healthcare and KevinMD. In addition, the current AAFP President Elect wrote this letter to a recent Bloomberg News Article. 

Not only will there be strong opinions on stage, but also on social media as well. A recent example of this was the twitter stream during the live broadcasts of the Escape Fire film on CNN using the #RescueHealthcare hashtag. As I stated in a previous post, I believe that Family Medicine and Primary Care missed an opportunity to be proactive in portraying a positive message for our specialty.

I hope that the discussion does not degrade to personal or professional attacks on stage and on social media. Primary care physicians and primary care nurses must both build their workforces. We can't build one at the expense of the other. The Patient Centered Medical Home focuses on tailoring care to the patient by deploying a team of physicians, nurses, pharmacists, physical therapists, sub specialists, and any other health professional who work together to meet the patient's needs.​

So, again, I'm challenging the Family Medicine community to not only tune in tomorrow morning at 8am for the live video stream, but also I challenge the Family Medicine community to be proactive and participate on twitter using the #ProHCBB hashtag in addition to #AAFP to help spread the message. Will #FMRevolution rise to the occasion? We'll see...

Match Day 2013 Reflections

Match Day 2013 ​was two days ago, and I've had a couple days to reflect to come up with some kind of meaning, if anything, to those events. Here are some random thoughts.

Memories of my own Match Day: Even though it's been 15 years since my own Match Day, as a physician, I still have this excitement for the coming of this particular day. I can definitely relate to what these medical students are going through. Best of luck to all the future graduates!

Good day for Primary Care: Even though there were more US medical students matched in Family Medicine versus one year ago, there was a 3.4 percent decrease versus 2012. The AAFP President is hopeful, but states that "Our Work Is Far From Finished." I would agree with that assessment.

Kudos To @TheNRMP twitter account: Whomever is behind the NRMP twitter account is doing a great job. I checked them out even a few days before Match Day. I enjoyed how they responded to students and to organizations when tweeting about Match related activities. And on Match Day itself, the account was sending congratulations and encouraging social media collaborations. Well done!

The Last Fun Match Day on Social Media: I was in my office hours the afternoon of Match Day, and it was great to follow. To me, it felt like New Year's Eve/Day in that you could see when the medical schools were opening their Match Day envelopes, almost like by time zone. And then you would see the excitement on twitter, and see the pics that were being shared. Unfortunately, I think this will be the last year of that. As Match Day was winding down on twitter, I could see some corporations and medical industry organizations invading some of the hashtags - "Congratulations to those who matched, and don't forget about our medically related product." I predict that you'll see that more next year, and that's sad...