Using Social Media for Public Health: Some Proof

I’ve been beating the drum lately about how public health and crisis communication folks can and should be using social media. (Also here and here.)

The problem is most decision makers think this is still just a bunch of kids and out-of-work job hunters playing on FaceSpace and “twittering, twuttering, whatever the hell you call it.” (Note: Playing dumb as a way to denigrate something you don’t understand? Not endearing. Are you that confused, or just trying to be funny?)

But the Pew Internet & Life Project (official motto: “we’re smart, and we can prove it with a ±2% error margin”) is backing this idea as well. Susannah Fox recently spoke at the National Conference on Health Communication, Marketing & Media, sponsored by the National Center for Health Marketing, Coordinating Center for Health Information and Service, and the Office of Enterprise Communication, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration, the National Cancer Institute and the National Public Health Information Coalition.

In other words, people who don’t take this stuff lightly. I used to be in the same field, and I know if the CDC and NPHIC are paying attention, then other people need to be paying attention as well.

Some interesting statistics from Susannah’s slide deck:

• 79% of adults in the U.S. use the Internet. Of those people, how many have stopped getting their news from newspapers, radio, and TV? We had an LP tanker explosion at a major Interstate intersection. I heard about it on Twitter, not TV. And a newspaper would have been useless for up-to-date news.
• 48% of African Americans and 47% of Latinos go online with a handheld device; only 27% for whites. Since black people also have a very high occurrence of chronic diseases like high blood pressure and diabetes, handhelds could be a great way to have them access important public health information.
• Did you know there’s a website called PatientsLikeMe.com? Yeah, me either. But it’s for people who have “life changing conditions.” They’re talking to each other and learning from each other. (Know who that’s going to inconvenience? Doctors. They’re suddenly not the smartest ones in the room, the patients are.)

I could go on and on, but, well, there are only 7 slides in the deck (Rule #1 of good PowerPoint: Don’t use a lot of slides.)

But the moral of the story is that if you’re in public health, look at social media as a way to get your message out. Quit relying on the traditional media. Get out of 1987 and join us up here in the 21st century. A vast majority of the public is, but you’re still putting all your eggs in a newspaper-lined basket. Keep old school media in your toolbox, but quit reaching for it first.

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