Social media : a comprehensive knowledge synthesis and case studies of applications in medicine and health(care)

Social media are dynamic tools that have allowed virtual socialization and dialogue to emerge on the Internet. Although the term is often used synonymously with social networking and web 2.0, social media have penetrated intra-personal and professional communication extensively and their use has become essentially tacit knowledge among teenagers, and increasingly in the general population. To date, the value of social media to health professionals as a tool for clinical activity and in public health has not been extensively studied. Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, YouTube, Flickr, Mashups and Second Life are no longer obscure words in the vocabularies of highly technical people. These spaces are starting to replace face-to-face interaction in a large majority of populations and institutions. Healthcare has not been isolated from this trend. The evidence base for the use of social media is rising exponentially, with applications in medical education, collaboration, surveillance, clinical trials, public health, and health services research. However, the comprehensive documentation of how, where and why these tools are affecting health(care) is not well documented. This thesis provides a comprehensive review of the impact of social media in medicine and health(care). Chapter 1 provides an overview of the conceptual and theoretical frameworks, along with the assumptions, that guide the use of social media in the health domain. Chapter 2 synthesizes the what, where, when, how and why social media are being adopted, structured according to the different functionalities of social media. These include blogs, microblogs, social networking, professional and thematic networking, wikis, media sharing tools, mashups, collaborative filtering/bookmarking and other social media (e.g., Second Life). Chapter 2 also discusses a series of clinical implications and recommendations for stakeholders wishing to engage these dynamic spaces. Chapter 3 reviews three recent administrative and judicial cases that have emerged from the inappropriate use of social media and Chapter 4 concludes with the main implications of and significance of the findings. Further research is clearly required to solidify the evidence on the use of social media in health care and to explore and document its economic, clinical, governance and tactical impact and utility.Graduate and Postdoctoral StudiesGraduat

Wikis and collaborative writing applications in healthcare: a scoping review protocol.

ABSTRACT The rapid rise in the use of collaborative writing applications (eg, wikis, Google Documents, and Google Knol) has created the need for a systematic synthesis of the evidence of their impact as knowledge translation (KT) tools in the health care sector and for an inventory of the factors that affect their use. While researchers have conducted systematic reviews on a range of software-based information and communication technologies as well as other social media (eg, virtual communities of practice, virtual peer-to-peer communities, and electronic support groups), none have reviewed collaborative writing applications in the medical sector. The overarching goal of this project is to explore the depth and breadth of evidence for the use of collaborative writing applications in health care. Thus, the purposes of this scoping review will be to (1) map the literature on collaborative writing applications; (2) compare the applications’ features; (3) describe the evidence of each application’s positive and negative effects as a KT intervention in health care; (4) inventory and describe the barriers and facilitators that affect the applications’ use; and (5) produce an action plan and a research agenda. A six-stage framework for scoping reviews will be used: (1) identifying the research question; (2) identifying relevant studies within the selected databases (using the EPPI-Reviewer software to classify the studies); (3) selecting studies (an iterative process in which two reviewers search the literature, refine the search strategy, and review articles for inclusion); (4) charting the data (using EPPI-Reviewer’s data-charting form); (5) collating, summarizing, and reporting the results (performing a descriptive, numerical, and interpretive synthesis); and (6) consulting knowledge users during three planned meetings. Since this scoping review concerns the use of collaborative writing applications as KT interventions in health care, we will use the Knowledge to Action (KTA) framework to describe and compare the various studies and collaborative writing projects we find. In addition to guiding the use of collaborative writing applications in health care, this scoping review will advance the science of KT by testing tools that could be used to evaluate other social media. We also expect to identify areas that require further systematic reviews and primary research and to produce a highly relevant research agenda that explores and leverages the potential of collaborative writing software. To date, this is the first study to use the KTA framework to study the role collaborative writing applications in KT, and the first to involve three national and international institutional knowledge users as part of the research process

Implementation and Evaluation of a Wiki Involving Multiple Stakeholders Including Patients in the Promotion of Best Practices in Trauma Care: The WikiTrauma Interrupted Time Series Protocol

Contains fulltext : 152344.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)BACKGROUND: Trauma is the most common cause of mortality among people between the ages of 1 and 45 years, costing Canadians 19.8 billion dollars a year (2004 data), yet half of all patients with major traumatic injuries do not receive evidence-based care, and significant regional variation in the quality of care across Canada exists. Accordingly, our goal is to lead a research project in which stakeholders themselves will adapt evidence-based trauma care knowledge tools to their own varied institutional contexts and cultures. We will do this by developing and assessing the combined impact of WikiTrauma, a free collaborative database of clinical decision support tools, and Wiki101, a training course teaching participants how to use WikiTrauma. WikiTrauma has the potential to ensure that all stakeholders (eg, patients, clinicians, and decision makers) can all contribute to, and benefit from, evidence-based clinical knowledge about trauma care that is tailored to their own needs and clinical setting. OBJECTIVE: Our main objective will be to study the combined effect of WikiTrauma and Wiki101 on the quality of care in four trauma centers in Quebec. METHODS: First, we will pilot-test the wiki with potential users to create a version ready to test in practice. A rapid, iterative prototyping process with 15 health professionals from nonparticipating centers will allow us to identify and resolve usability issues prior to finalizing the definitive version for the interrupted time series. Second, we will conduct an interrupted time series to measure the impact of our combined intervention on the quality of care in four trauma centers that will be selected-one level I, one level II, and two level III centers. Participants will be health care professionals working in the selected trauma centers. Also, five patient representatives will be recruited to participate in the creation of knowledge tools destined for their use (eg, handouts). All participants will be invited to complete the Wiki101 training and then use, and contribute to, WikiTrauma for 12 months. The primary outcome will be the change over time of a validated, composite, performance indicator score based on 15 process performance indicators found in the Quebec Trauma Registry. RESULTS: This project was funded in November 2014 by the Canadian Medical Protective Association. We expect to start this trial in early 2015 and preliminary results should be available in June 2016. Two trauma centers have already agreed to participate and two more will be recruited in the next months. CONCLUSIONS: We expect that this study will add important and unique evidence about the effectiveness, safety, and cost savings of using collaborative platforms to adapt knowledge implementation tools across jurisdictions