Sermo becomes official AMA social network
According to the Press Release from Sermo:
The American Medical Association (AMA) and Sermo today announced a collaborative agreement to empower physicians by making their collective voice heard in a way never before possible. By teaming with Sermo, the AMA will be able to address important professional and public health issues in a multi-phase, multi-year alliance aimed at improving medical practice, physician advocacy, and patient care.
This will include:
…a “Discuss on Sermo” link in AMA print and online publications, including the AMA’s award-winning American Medical News, which reach more than 350,000 physicians. This new link will allow physicians nationwide to immediately discuss, survey, and corroborate opinions about the latest health care news and research.
Plenty of academic and public librarians have stressed the importance of being where their patrons are and having a presence in Facebook or MySpace. This announcement may indicate that a greater number of physician patrons are going to be using Sermo. Perhaps your medical library(/librarian) should, too.
More:
Negative commentary from Pharmalot (thanks to Kevin, MD for pointing this one out).
The Health Care Blog also has an interview with Sermo CEO Daniel Palestrant about the deal:
If the inline player doesn’t suit you, you can download the interview as an mp3 here.
Previous posts about Social Networks for Clinicians
- More Social Networks for Clinicians
- NurseLinkUp: MySpace for Nurses
- Sermo: Another “MySpace for Physicians”
- Healtheva: MySpace for Doctors?
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May 30th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
i have to wonder – how is what Sermo’s doing any different than what medical bloggers are being sued for? just looking at their homepage, it presents ambigous stories of patients, oddly similiar to what medical bloggers do, yet they’re being sued and closing shop. so, what is the difference?
May 30th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
Hi JBI-
I know virtually nothing about the medical bloggers being sued that you mention, so I really couldn’t say. Would you recommend any particular reading with which I could get caught up on the topic?
Thanks!
May 31st, 2007 at 1:18 pm
I am leading Healtheva, an online social network for physicians and life science researchers. Our product enables physicians to track medical literature and share insights with one another, contribute original content and blogs, and maintain a social network and profile.
Healtheva is building a life science research community that includes both physicians as well as basic science researchers and clinical researchers.
Healtheva aims to connect the physician in private practice with the latest innovations from teaching hospitals and research universities. Physicians are able to evaluate drugs and medical devices in the post market and yet also suggest new innovative therapies and diagnostics to the community for analysis and feedback.
At the other end of the healthcare spectrum, basic science researchers are able to collaborate with clinical researchers and practicing physicians to target their discoveries to provide the maximum clinical benefit.
Healtheva is in Beta.
May 31st, 2007 at 1:23 pm
Hi Sunil-
If you search, you’ll find I have posted about Healtheva multiple times on this blog.
Best,
-David
June 5th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
[...] Be sure to read this post about Sermo becoming the offical social network of the American Medical Association. [...]
June 7th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
well, Flea just lost his malpractice suit due to his blogging. Additionally, several other medical bloggers have closed up shop either out of fear or from administrative pressure at their workplaces….
i was just wondering what, if there is any, difference is between the two bc they seem awfully similiar to me, but i’m an english guy so there may be something i’m missing. any insight would be greatly appreciated….
June 7th, 2007 at 7:32 pm
JBI-
I really don’t know a lot about it, but Flea was NOT sued for blogging.
My understanding from briefly reading a number of items about it is that Flea
settled his malpractice case because he blogged far too specifically about details of his case and opposing counsel found out about it. If his comments about the case were seen by the jury, it is unlikely he could have won the case.
Flea was not prosecuted for blogging. Flea’s blogging made his case unwinnable. That doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with physicians blogging, but that some topics and attitudes are unwise to showcase in a blog.
June 8th, 2007 at 10:48 am
David,
thanks for your response. i was aware that he wasn’t sued for blogging, but that his blogging led to his downfall. i am not aware of any bloggers that have been sued for blogging (and quite frankly, given the 1st amendment, don’t see how such a thing could occur); however, i am aware that several medical bloggers have closed shop either out of fear of being sued due to patient privacy issues or have been pressured by their admin’s to close shop for the same reason (among others).
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2007/06/another-medblogger-down.html
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2007/05/er-blogger-in-trouble-over-patient.html
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2007/05/black-wednesday-dark-day-for-medical.html
just found it odd that some med bloggers were expressing fear of discussing cases they see while sermo seems to do the exact same thing only on a mass scale.
as always, i welcome and look forward to your thoughts…
June 19th, 2007 at 11:33 am
[...] Note to Sermo (recently selected as the official social network of the AMA): If you get your users free access to UpToDate, I’ll certainly spend a lot more time posting about Sermo. [...]
August 6th, 2007 at 2:01 am
[...] Sermo becomes official AMA social network [...]
August 22nd, 2007 at 7:05 am
[...] Sermo becomes official AMA social network [...]