Blogger – Doctor's Bag

How to create a blog that makes a difference

18/11/201419/01/2019Edwin Kruys

“If you are working on something exciting that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you.” ~ Steve Jobs

It’s great to see the steady increase in interest for social media in healthcare. What’s your passion? If you are keen to start a blog or further improve your blogging skills, there are amazing bloggers you should follow, like Seth Godin, Jeff Goins, Michael Hyatt.

My slideshow How to create a blog that makes a difference (above) contains quotes and tips from some of my idols in the blogosphere. I have also attempted to collect and present the (many) reasons why people start a blog in healthcare, common pitfalls, 3 steps for putting a great blog idea into action, and lots of tips for writing awesome posts.

Enjoy!

How social media is changing the healthcare landscape

18/10/201401/11/2014Edwin Kruys

There seems to be a significant growth of social media usage in the Australian healthcare industry.

In the past years we have seen surprisingly influential social media campaigns, like AHPRAaction, ScrapTheCap, InternCrisis, and very recently NoAdsPlease. These campaigns not only rally for better health care policies; they also signal a shift towards more transparency and accountability.

Characteristics of the social media campaigns are:

They spread quickly and generate a lot of media attention
The participants are very passionate about their cause
They are often supported by different groups including consumers
They may or may not be supported by professional organisations
They are very effective.

At the same time other social media movements, like FOAM (free open access medical education) are gaining momentum. Again, these grassroots initiatives are driven by passion – a powerful force. It won’t take long before health care professionals can do their continuing professional education via free social media sources.

I don’t think many professional and health care organisations are ready for these changes – yet they are coming whether we like it or not.

Psychiatrist and blogger Dr Helen Schultz is a social media enthusiast. Helen was involved in the successful AHPRAaction campaign. She believes social media skills are important for doctors: “I feel in the next 6-12 months there will be even more awareness of the need for doctors to know how to use social media professionally, but also how to use it to your advantage, building your brand, your platform and your voice.”

“The time has passed where we can be complacent and think patients will listen to us just because we are doctors,” she says. “We are largely absent from health debates currently, and others educate about health which may not always be necessarily evidenced based. In addition, we must claim our social media real estate, ie own our domain names and twitter handles to prevent others pretending to be us.”

Helen has taken it upon herself to organise a social media workshop for doctors and managers, and she has invited me to speak about blogging. Helen: “On the back of the success of the AHPRAaction campaign – and because I was so inspired by my colleagues around Australia, I thought we had to meet and put our heads together about how doctors can use social media in Australia to join health debates and run really successful campaigns.”

Some excellent speakers presenting at the workshop: Ms Dionne Kasian-Lew, Dr Brad McKay, Ms Jen Morris, Dr Jill Tomlinson, Dr Amit Vohra, Ms Mary Freer, and Dr Marie Bismark. Dr Mukesh Haikerwal is guest of honour.

Social Media by the Sea is a full day interactive workshop with practical tips and insights from the experts about their successful use of social media, whether it be as a blogger, advocate or part of campaign building. Time: Saturday, 15 November 2014. Place: Peppers “The Sands Resort”, Torquay, Victoria. Send email.

Amazing Australian GP Bloggers

11/08/201413/01/2019Edwin Kruys

What is it like to be a General Practitioner in Australia? What are Australian Family Doctors passionate about? What do they struggle with? The Amazing Australian GP Bloggers 2014 give readers a rare look behind the scene.

Bloggers like Justin Coleman, Jacquie Garton-Smith, Genevieve Yates and Penny Wilson are great storytellers with an impressive writing talent. Penny’s post Sorry… But are you really a doctor, reached number 7 in the most popular WordPress blog posts worldwide.

Then there are the GP bloggers who focus on teaching and sharing skills and knowledge, like Michael Tam, Casey Parker, Tim Leeuwenburg, Minh Le Cong and Robin Park. They are responsible for a vast amount of freely accessible medical information. Much of their work can be found via the excellent foam4gp blog.

It is good to see that some GP bloggers post valuable information for patients, such as Jo Kosterich, Brad McKay and Nick Tellis. Duncan Jefferson is creating a nice podcast collection on his blog.

Examples of posts I enjoyed: How to live to 150 in 10 easy steps, by Brad McKay; The art of uncertainty in general practice, by Marlene Pearce; When Terry Barnes and I bumped into each other on Twitter, by Tim Senior.

The stream of stories, confessions, opinions, experiences, tutorials, interviews and podcasts just goes on. It is impossible to mention everyone here, so I refer to the list below.

I would like to finish with acknowledging the hard work these doctors are putting into their blogs. From experience I know it can be a challenge to keep the momentum of writing going. Even though it is a passion, it is not always easy.

All these creative GP bloggers have inspired me, and I’m sure you will (continue to) enjoy their posts! Click on the WordPress/Blogger logo to go to a blog.

How many days start with the letter T?

Why are doctors so unkind to each other?

10 podcasts for GPs (and their patients)

5 ingredients for effective collaboration

5 things to remember before a doctor’s visit

Tag: Blogger