140 Health Care Uses for Twitter
http://philbaumann.com/2009/01/16/140-health-care-uses-for-twitter/

Twitter’s simplicity of functional design, speed of delivery and ability to connect two or more people around the world provides a powerful means of communication, idea-sharing and collaboration. There’s potency in the ability to burst out 140 characters, including a shortened URI. Could this power have any use in healthcare? After all, for example, doctors and nurses share medical information, often as short bursts of data (lab values, conditions, orders, etc.).

Information about utilizing Twitter and healthcare

The possibilities that I believe Twitter offers currently far exceeds the constraints. I won’t offer work-around solutions to these constraints in this post. I want to focus on the possibilities because once we see the potential, we may have stonger motivations to deal intelligently with the constraints. So when reading this list, don’t get hung up on the details, the fears, the anxieties that may be provoked by the realities of health care as it is practiced today. It’s the 21st Century: let’s be imaginative, determined and innovative. Let’s be remarkable.

Web-based and social media tools are making it easier to get health information, find doctors, make appointments, keep records, and get support.

"One of the most obvious ways that the web and social media are making our lives healthier, is in the proliferation of health information."

RateADrug, The users guide to prescription medications and side effects. Comparing RX and complementary medicine; providing best health treatment options at lowest cost, expert help, community resources, patient testimonials, educational and healthcare opportunities.

View or submit ratings on effectiveness and side effects on Rx drugs and alternative treatments

The community site for sharing experiences and learning about risks and benefits of prescription medications and alternative treatments

RateADrug.com - Where users identify, evaluate and rate over 7000 prescription drugs and alternative treatments The community site for sharing experiences and learning about risks and benefits of prescription medications and alternative treatments Take control of your health. Be informed. * Learn about newly discovered side effects and alternative treatments * Participate in anonymous public studies and share your experiences with others * Rate your medications to receive personalized benefits and side effects scores * Email your survey reports to your doctors and family members to keep them updated on your health issues

Americans' pursuit of health takes place within a widening network of both online and offline sources. Whereas someone may have in the past called a health professional, their Mom, or a good friend, they now are also reading blogs, listening to podcasts, updating their social network profile, and posting comments. This Pew Internet/California HealthCare Foundation survey finds that technology is not an end, but a means to accelerate the pace of discovery, widen social networks, and sharpen the questions someone might ask when they do get to talk to a health professional. Technology can help to enable the human connection in health care and the internet is turning up the information network’s volume.

Americans' pursuit of health takes place within a widening network of both online and offline sources.

This Pew Internet/California HealthCare Foundation survey finds that technology is not an end, but a means to accelerate the pace of discovery, widen social networks, and sharpen the questions someone might ask when they do get to talk to a health professional. Technology can help to enable the human connection in health care and the internet is turning up the information network’s volume.

study conducted nov-dec 2008, published june 2009