Print

Social (and new) media technologies have proven effective and valuable in many areas of the health industry.  Given this, a number of health organizations, including hospitals have begun to slowly embrace social tools. For example, there are more than five thousand hospitals in the United States, and (as of September 2009):

• 87 hospitals have Facebook pages
• 128 have YouTube channels
• 140 have Twitter accounts, and
• 23 have blogs.

However, many hospitals are not taking full advantage of social technologies, using these tools to republish press releases rather than utilizing them to improve and expand communications opportunities.

A few hospitals are breaking ground. Most notably, Mayo Clinic, long viewed as a very traditional institution and an unlikely pioneer in the fields of advertising, marketing and new media. While some hospital groups were using high-profile advertising campaigns to attract patients, Mayo relied on word-of-mouth and physician referrals, concentrating its resources in research, education and clinical practice.

Today, Mayo is regarded as a leader in the social media arena. According to the director of Web strategy at the University of Maryland Medical Systems, Ed Bennett, “What they’ve decided is that social media is nothing more than word-of-mouth extended into the electronic world.”

Mayo’s marketing committee chairman Dr. Thoralf Sundt explained the hospital’s rationale for employing social technologies to communicate with the public, saying, “As we see people communicating in new ways, we want Mayo Clinic to be part of the conversation.”