Internet Medical Association

March 10, 2014

The social (media) side to rheumatology.

Nat Rev Rheumatol. 2014 Mar 4;

A revolution is underway in the fields of education and health practice. Social media are now considered by the new generations of students, doctors and patients as a useful tool for learning and for doctor-doctor, doctor-patient and patient-patient communications. However, should we be excited by this revolution or afraid of it? Advantages and challenges of such new tools for medicine in general and rheumatology in particular are discussed in this Perspectives.

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Facebook partner notification in syphilis

Public Health Rep. 2014 Jan-Feb;129 Suppl 1:43-9

Public health professionals face many challenges in infectious disease cluster case identification and partner notification (PN), especially in populations using social media as a primary communication venue. We present a method using Facebook and social network diagram illustration to identify, link, and notify individuals in a cluster of syphilis cases in young black men who have sex with men (MSM). Use of Facebook was crucial in identifying two of 55 individuals with syphilis, and the cooperation of socially connected individuals with traditional PN methods yielded a high number of contacts per case. Integration of PN services for HIV and sexually transmitted diseases, as well as collaboration between the city and state information systems, assisted in the cluster investigation. Given that rates of syphilis and HIV infection are increasing significantly in young African American MSM, the use of social media can provide an additional avenue to facilitate case identification and notification.

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March 9, 2014

A Mixed-Methods Study of Young Adults' Receptivity to Using Facebook for Smoking Cessation: If You Build It, Will They Come?

Am J Health Promot. 2014 Feb 27;

Purpose . To determine whether young adults are interested in a Facebook intervention for smoking cessation and to inform the design of such an intervention. Design . Mixed-methods. Setting . Participants throughout the United States were recruited through Facebook. Participants . Young adults aged 18 to 25 years who had smoked at least once in the past month. Method . Participants (N = 570) completed an online survey of tobacco and social media use. A subset of 30 survey completers, stratified by motivation to quit smoking, agreed to participate in a structured interview over online chat. Themes were identified by using grounded theory. Results . Approximately a third of the full sample (31%) reported they would want to get help to quit smoking by using Facebook. Interest in using Facebook to quit was greater among those who were more motivated to quit (χ(2) = 75.2, p < .001), had made a quit attempt in the past year (χ(2) = 16.0, p < .001), and had previously used the Internet for assistance with a quit attempt (χ(2) = 6.2, p = .013). In qualitative interviews, social support and convenience were identified as strengths of a Facebook intervention, while privacy was the main issue of concern. Conclusion . Nearly one in three young adult smokers on Facebook expressed interest in using Facebook for quitting smoking. Social media approaches that respect privacy and tailor to readiness to quit are likely to maximize participation.

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March 7, 2014

Evaluation of internet-based dengue query data: google dengue trends.

PLoS Negl Trop Dis. 2014 Feb;8(2):e2713

Dengue is a common and growing problem worldwide, with an estimated 70-140 million cases per year. Traditional, healthcare-based, government-implemented dengue surveillance is resource intensive and slow. As global Internet use has increased, novel, Internet-based disease monitoring tools have emerged. Google Dengue Trends (GDT) uses near real-time search query data to create an index of dengue incidence that is a linear proxy for traditional surveillance. Studies have shown that GDT correlates highly with dengue incidence in multiple countries on a large spatial scale. This study addresses the heterogeneity of GDT at smaller spatial scales, assessing its accuracy at the state-level in Mexico and identifying factors that are associated with its accuracy. We used Pearson correlation to estimate the association between GDT and traditional dengue surveillance data for Mexico at the national level and for 17 Mexican states. Nationally, GDT captured approximately 83% of the variability in reported cases over the 9 study years. The correlation between GDT and reported cases varied from state to state, capturing anywhere from 1% of the variability in Baja California to 88% in Chiapas, with higher accuracy in states with higher dengue average annual incidence. A model including annual average maximum temperature, precipitation, and their interaction accounted for 81% of the variability in GDT accuracy between states. This climate model was the best indicator of GDT accuracy, suggesting that GDT works best in areas with intense transmission, particularly where local climate is well suited for transmission. Internet accessibility (average ∼36%) did not appear to affect GDT accuracy. While GDT seems to be a less robust indicator of local transmission in areas of low incidence and unfavorable climate, it may indicate cases among travelers in those areas. Identifying the strengths and limitations of novel surveillance is critical for these types of data to be used to make public health decisions and forecas! ting models.

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March 6, 2014

Medical student views on the use of Facebook profile screening by residency admissions committees.

Postgrad Med J. 2014 Feb 27;

PURPOSE: Previous research has shown that >50% of residency programmes indicate that inappropriate Facebook postings could be grounds for rejecting a student applicant. This study sought to understand medical students' views regarding the impact of their Facebook postings on the residency admissions process.
STUDY DESIGN: In 2011-2012, we conducted a national survey of 7144 randomly selected medical students representing 10% of current enrollees in US medical schools. Students were presented with a hypothetical scenario of a residency admissions committee searching Facebook and finding inappropriate pictures of a student, and were asked how the committee ought to regard these pictures.
RESULTS: The response rate was 30% (2109/7144). Respondents did not differ from medical students nationally with regard to type of medical school and regional representation. Of the three options provided, the majority of respondents (63.5%) indicated 'the pictures should be considered along with other factors, but should not be grounds for automatic rejection of the application'. A third (33.7%) believed 'the pictures should have no bearing on my application; the pictures are irrelevant'. A small minority of respondents (2.8%) felt 'the pictures should be grounds for automatic rejection of the application'.
CONCLUSIONS: That the views of students regarding the consequences of their online activity differ so greatly from the views of residency admissions committees speaks to the need for better communication between these parties. It also presents opportunities for medical schools to help students in their residency application process by increasing awareness of social media screening strategies used by some residency programmes, and fostering self-awareness around the use of social media during medical school and especially during the residency application process.

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March 5, 2014

The Dramatic Rise of Social Media in Urology: Trends in Twitter Use at the American and Canadian Urological Association Annual Meetings in 2012 and 2013.

J Urol. 2014 Feb 24;

PURPOSE: Social media have become established as tools for rapid information dissemination to a broad audience. A major use has been the compilation of conference-specific messaging, known as 'tweets', via pre-selected 'hashtags' on Twitter. We analyzed Twitter use between consecutive years at the annual meetings of the American (AUA) and Canadian Urological Association (CUA) annual meetings.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: Publicly available tweets containing the established meeting hashtags were abstracted from an online archive. Tweets were categorized by author type and categorized by content as either informative (based on research presented at the conference) or uninformative (unrelated to presented data) based on an established classification scheme.
RESULTS: We analyzed 5402 tweets over the combined 18 meeting days, of which 4098 were original and 1304 were rebroadcasted prior tweets. There was a large increase in Twitter use at the 2013 annual meetings (4591 tweets from 540 accounts) over the 2012 meetings (811 tweets from 134 accounts). Biotechnology analysts published the highest volume of tweets (226; 28%) in 2012; this majority shifted to urologists in 2013 (2765 tweets; 60%). In 2012, 29% were categorized as informative; this proportion increased to 41% at the 2013 meetings.
CONCLUSIONS: Twitter has emerged as a significant communication platform at urological meetings, and its use increased dramatically between 2012 and 2013. Urologists have increasingly led this discussion with an increased focus on data arising from meeting proceedings. This adjunct to traditional meeting activity merits the attention of urologists and of the professional associations that host such meetings.

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Social media guidelines and best practices: recommendations from the council of residency directors social media task force.

West J Emerg Med. 2014 Feb;15(1):26-30

Social media has become a staple of everyday life among over one billion people worldwide. A social networking presence has become a hallmark of vibrant and transparent communications. It has quickly become the preferred method of communication and information sharing. It offers the ability for various entities, especially residency programs, to create an attractive internet presence and "brand" the program. Social media, while having significant potential for communication and knowledge transfer, carries with it legal, ethical, personal, and professional risks. Implementation of a social networking presence must be deliberate, transparent, and optimize potential benefits while minimizing risks. This is especially true with residency programs. The power of social media as a communication, education, and recruiting tool is undeniable. Yet the pitfalls of misuse can be disastrous, including violations in patient confidentiality, violations of privacy, and recruiting misconduct. These guidelines were developed to provide emergency medicine residency programs leadership with guidance and best practices in the appropriate use and regulation of social media, but are applicable to all residency programs that wish to establish a social media presence.

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When can social media lead financial markets?

Sci Rep. 2014;4:4213

Social media analytics is showing promise for the prediction of financial markets. However, the true value of such data for trading is unclear due to a lack of consensus on which instruments can be predicted and how. Current approaches are based on the evaluation of message volumes and are typically assessed via retrospective (ex-post facto) evaluation of trading strategy returns. In this paper, we present instead a sentiment analysis methodology to quantify and statistically validate which assets could qualify for trading from social media analytics in an ex-ante configuration. We use sentiment analysis techniques and Information Theory measures to demonstrate that social media message sentiment can contain statistically-significant ex-ante information on the future prices of the S&P500 index and a limited set of stocks, in excess of what is achievable using solely message volumes.

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Tuberculosis surveillance by analyzing Google trends.

IEEE Trans Biomed Eng. 2011 Aug;58(8)

Tuberculosis (TB) is a major global health concern, causing nearly ten million new cases and over one million deaths every year. The early detection of possible epidemic is the first and important defense line against tuberculosis. However, traditional surveillance approaches, e.g. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), publish the TB morbidity surveillance results on a quarterly basis, with months of reporting lag. Moreover, in some developing countries, where most infections occur, there may not be enough medical resources to build traditional surveillance systems. To improve early detection of tuberculosis outbreaks, we developed a syndromic approach to estimate the actual number of TB cases using Google Search Volume. Specifically, the search volume of nineteen TB-related terms, obtained from January 2004 to April 2009, were examined for surveillance purpose. Contemporary TB surveillance data were extracted from the CDCs reports to build and evaluate the syndromic system. We estimate the actual TB occurrences using a non-stationary dynamic system. Respective models are built to monitor both national-level and state-level TB activities. The surveillance results of the syndromic system can be updated every day, which is twelve weeks ahead of CDCs reports.

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March 2, 2014

Facebook enhances antidepressant pharmacotherapy effects.

ScientificWorldJournal. 2014;2014:892048

Treatment-resistant major depressive disorder (TR-MDD) is a complex condition, with very low remission rates. In recent years some studies have been conducted on the implementation of cognitive behavioral therapy and psychodynamic psychotherapy interventions via the Internet to MDD patients, and results have been promising. However, there have been no studies in patients with TR-MDD nor with the use of Facebook with the psychiatrist as "friend." 60 TR-MDD patients were randomized to one of three groups: Facebook group with psychiatrist as "friend," Facebook group without psychiatrist as "friend," and control group (no Facebook use). Both Facebook groups spent at least 1 hour/day on Facebook, 7 days/week, during the 3 months. All patients maintained their usual pharmacotherapy. All participants were evaluated at baseline and at 1, 2, and 3 months for depressive symptoms using HAD17 and BDI-II. Results show that both Facebook groups had a decrease on HADM17 and BDI-II scores as well as higher remission and response rates than the control group, with better results if the psychiatrist was a "friend" on Facebook. Therefore, in TR-MDD, Facebook can be used as an effective enhancement therapy, adjuvant to pharmacological therapy with regular consultations, especially if the psychiatrist is the patient's online "friend."

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February 27, 2014

"It would be weird to have that on Facebook": young people's use of social media and the risk of sharing sexual health information.

Reprod Health Matters. 2013 May;21(41):35-44

In today's media environment, information is not simply passed from producers to consumers, but is mediated by participants of new media cultures, including information on sexual health. In focus groups held in Sydney and regional Australia in 2011, we asked young people aged 16-22 about the potential for sexual health promotion via Facebook and other social media. Our findings point to the complex ways in which young people use social media, and the unlikelihood of traditional take-home sexual health messages having traction in social media spaces. Five key aspects which emerged were: the participatory culture of social network sites; the stigma of sexual health, especially sexually transmitted infections (STIs); young people's careful presentations of self; privacy concerns; and the importance of humour in sexual health messaging. Fears of bullying and gossip (or 'drama') were also likely to prevent the dissemination of sexual health messages in this environment. However, humorous online videos were noted by participants as a significant way to avoid stigma and enable the sharing of sexual health information. The young people in our study were interested in sexual health information, but did not want to access it at the cost of their own sense of comfort and belonging in their social networks. Any sexual health promotion within these sites must be understood as a site-specific intervention.

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The use of a google search in the diagnosis of a rare condition.

Female Pelvic Med Reconstr Surg. 2014 Mar-Apr;20(2):121-2

BACKGROUND: This study aims to describe the use of the Internet in aiding the diagnosis of a rare lower urinary tract finding in a primiparous woman.
METHODS: A case of bladder schistosomiasis was reviewed.
RESULTS: After the referral from the obstetrics service with a bladder lesion noted on dating ultrasound, an asymptomatic primipara with 9 weeks of gestational age presented for cystoscopy. A polypoid lesion was noted, and suspected diagnosis of schistosomiasis was made using a Google image search. Urine cytologic evaluation confirmed the diagnosis, and the patient was treated without need for further invasive testing or bladder biopsy.
CONCLUSIONS: The usefulness of Internet searches and other electronic resources should be appreciated in the diagnosis of rare conditions.

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