By April Sciacchitano (@aprilcs)
From chronic illness to weight loss, Americans are seeking mentors and training buddies when it comes to health and prevention. You know the traditional advisors by all those letters after their name. Then there are the new players in health and wellness who don’t have medical degrees: the social networks and bloggers.
Hospitals are full of people, but they haven’t mastered bringing this expertise and crowd-knowledge to life to work for them. Bloggers and social networks are providing people what they currently aren’t getting from their local health care provider: reliable content and social connections that become part of a daily wellness regimen.
Wellsphere catalogues conditions and related web resources. It includes conditions like arthritis, attention deficit disorder and kidney disease, as well as more holistic interests like yoga, parenting and green living. Under each topic is a summary of the issue, forums, related blog posts, and people to connect with on Twitter and Wellsphere. Together, they create a community that connects you to everything a hospital would: Experts, support groups and information on follow up care. These connections drill down to the local level with services like ConnectAde, a site that connects caregivers with the right resources in their geographic region.
Bloggers and social networks are also holding people accountable. Fit Bottomed Girls are stepping in as health coaches and issuing challenges for their readers to reach their weight loss goals.
And now, even your car is your friend in health. Ford is incorporating medical alerts into the car, with diabetes and allergy apps that will be able to check blood glucose levels or report on pollen levels.
There’s no question these resources are meaningful and helpful – and that traditional health care organizations are losing out. And they’re right to be cautious (because it really is life or death). However, hospitals need to integrate themselves into these new outlets.
How can hospitals get back in the game? Remember they are trusted content centers. Every brain in the hospital has some kind of medical expertise and personal perspective to offer. Hospitals need only tap into what they already have in a creative way.
First of all I love Fit Bottomed Girls! Your right, hospitals need to wake up and get on it. I realize they are short staffed but I think baby steps can be taken. My idea – start by hiring one or two content/social media people (perhaps that have medical backgrounds themselves, like a nurse or EMT) to help corral the experts and engage meaningfully with their audience online. Then assess the need and measure the impact; I think they will be surprised by the results.