Why I am here? More specifically why did I put myself online? I have a lot of people (in my personal life) that have asked me that. It’s really very simple. 1. Education 2. Awareness 3. Making It Personal
Over the past several years I grew frustrated by patients that were coming in with bad information. 99% of the time, the bad information was found on the internet. And you guys, there’s SO MUCH OF IT. I began to wonder who was writing this bad information and what gains they had for putting it out and I grew even more frustrated. However, I also realized that the information I rely on can be somewhat inaccessible and the volume available to the general public pales in comparison to the bad stuff that is out there. One day a colleague of mine said that she gets all of her news from social media. There it was. Social media is here to stay and if physicians and scientists don’t put their voices on it, we won’t be heard and misinformation will drown out real information.
Worse, we will look like we have something to hide.
Even though scientific articles are online now, they are often locked behind subscriptions or limited to those with academic library access. Further, the information that’s in those articles can be hard to understand, decipher, and put into context. Education was my first goal, but equally important is that I want to give Childhood Cancer providers and researchers a voice. To do this, I had to make it personal. I had to show the world me. I want people to know that doctors are real people. We celebrate our patients’ successes and we grieve their losses and defeats. We are all human and we are doing our best.
So, I set my frustration aside, took a leap of faith and I married the internet in an attempt to turn my frustration into action. It’s been an interesting ride so far. My initial hesitations were short lived and it’s been an overall positive experience. I’m on several different platforms including: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and of course this blog. I try to vary up the content between platforms, but it is really hard. Did you know that there are social media managers? Yeah, that’s an actual job now. I clearly don’t have one, so sometimes (more than I like) the content is the same or very similar.
I’m still trying to grow my audience so it’s not simply an echo chamber and I must say it’s a work in progress. I love getting comments and messages so drop me one to tell me how I am doing, what you would like less of, more of, or suggest some new topics!
