#HCSM Review – Oct. 3 Edition

The HCSM Review is a peer-reviewed blog carnival for everyone interested in health care social media.

As the Director for the Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media, I’m focused on demonstrating practical benefits of social media for patients. So in my call for submissions, I asked for posts testifying to the ways social media has helped patients.

Some of the submissions related more to devices than social media directly, but here’s an interesting roundup:

A Dose of Reality

After 14 hours of beating myself up, I realized I wasn’t to blame for being the F-patient…

“I realize there is a lot of huzzah and hurrah about the e-patient out there—perhaps among those who have the skill or leisure to be so well connected to social media. At times, I believe I’m one of the fold. But what about the f-patient? The well-meaning, diligent user of social media who finds herself inexplicably … well, the most accurate way to put it is … “f’d” by the health care system?

“In a one-night stay at my beloved local hospital, I found myself – seasoned cardiac patient that I am – misconstrued as a narcotics monger, migraine patient, and generalized neurotic, gaseous female.

“I had my smart phone. But, no charger. As the hours progressed into double digits and I realized my predicament, the best use of my phone was to call my internist and cardio, because no one at the hospital had bothered to do so. I suppose I could have accessed facebook at some point and drained battery, but to what end? Would it have furthered my progress? Doubtful. And besides, I was preoccupied with my roommate’s ongoing constipation/diarrhea issues on the other side of the curtain.

“So, I battled my way through that hospital stay by enlisting the nurse, technician, charge nurse, and eventually, the cardiologists, to get some attention and eventual data. Upon returning home, bruised, battered, and covered in residual EKG/telemetry stick’em I realized my truth: F-patient. Or at least until I had some free time on my hands to google, facebook and tweet.” – Katherine Leon

Editor’s Note: I got to meet Katherine last year when she attended our Social Media Residency and participated in our Social Media Summit at Mayo Clinic. Read her story here in the Wall Street Journal. I was one of the co-authors of the Mayo Clinic Proceedings article about how she helped instigate rare disease research through social media. And I’m proud that through Social Media Residency we helped her start her blog.

Health Care Decision Aids

“Following is an interview with Dr David Arterburn of Group Health Research in Seattle, Washington.  Dr Arterburn and his team have implemented Decision Aids that help patients make important choices about medical and surgical procedures.  They have also done a study showing that these Decision Aids reduced costs for the hospital.  You can read more about decision aids and the study here.” – Joan Justice

Cell Phones to Screen for Hearing Loss

Sana AudioPulse, developed by the Sana international team of students from MIT and the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), Harvard, Northeastern and the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN) in Brazil, allows healthcare personnel to screen for hearing loss with cellphones interfaced with specialized hardware.  Data is then securely transmitted  to a central database where a  trained audiologist will analyze it and store it in an electronic medical record.” – Joan Justice

Turning a Smartphone into a Healthcare Advocate

“So what does a family do when they need help and a private patient advocate isn’t an option? Currently, they might look for help from a community program, do some online research, or turn to their family and friends for answers….

“With your help, there will soon be another option: Grab your smartphones, or go online, and find help from the Pathfinder’s Virtual Advocate (PVA).” – Linda Adler

Happiness in the Real World

“So if you are not coping well what do you do to improve your ability to be resiliant and bounce back to at least a shadow of your former self?  How do you cope with pain, medications, numerous doctor appointments, and the feelings of guilt that you have for “letting people down” because you can no longer fill all of the roles that you could before?

“One place that you can find suppport is by talking to people who have similar problems to yours and these  days it is very easy to find them online, especially if you have a rare or less common disease.  I have been a member of a traditional online group for 7 years now and I get a lot of support and encouragement from the other members.” – Annette McKinnon

Also check out David Harlow’s roundup on Healthcamp Boston 2012.

The next HCSM Review host? SocialButterfly.