In this commentary published in Kaiser’s Permanente Journal, the authors describe the potential uses of social media to disseminate and acquire information, and to build trust among health care providers and patients. The increasing pervasiveness of social media is undeniable: 42% of adults in the U.S. use social networking sites; the rate is 86% among young adults (age 18-29 years). The authors note: “In a patient-centered model of health care, absence from social networks that are important to patients might lead to a gap between patients and clinicians.”
This is an open access article.
The article references Kaiser Permanente’s organizational social media policy, which is publicly available:
Ignatius Bau 