Anke Hollinderbäumer*, Institute of Medical Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Mainz, Germany Florian Walter, Institute of Medical Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Mainz, Germany Freya Trautmann, Institute of Medical Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Mainz, Germany Frank Ãœckert, Institute of Medical Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Mainz, Germany Tobias Hartz*, Institute of Medical Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Mainz, Germany Track: Research Presentation Topic: Ethical & legal issues, confidentiality and privacy Presentation Type: Oral presentation Submission Type: Single Presentation Building: Sol Principe Room: A - Alhambra Date: 2014-10-09 02:50 PM – 03:35 PM Last modified: 2014-09-03

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Background: The use of social networks has increased tremendously within the last years. Today, Twitter, Facebook and others are used to find information on medicine and health topics as well. Those services are also used by patients to get in contact with each other or with their physician. For physicians, on the other hand, this kind of communication can lead to legal and ethical issues, when it comes to data privacy. In Germany, the German Medical Association has published recommendations on the use of Social Media for physicians and medical students in May 2012. However, most clinics in Germany still have not implemented official guidelines on the use of social networks or use guidelines which do not focus on communication. This leads to an uncertainty among physicians about how the possible benefits of social networks can be used without negative consequences.
Objective: Therefore our aim was to develop and promote guidelines which give health care provider in general an orientation when using social networks to communicate with patients.

Methods: First we conducted an international systematic literature research using PubMed in order to identify relevant articles and guidelines which address in particular the issue of communication in social networks by health care professionals. In addition, relevant articles were sighted through hand search via references. Furthermore, relevant health care providers and organizations in Germany were asked for available guidelines. Therefore, all university hospitals, selected private hospitals, hospital chains and insurances as well as several physicians associations and non-profit organizations were approached by email or phone. Available guidelines were reviewed and categorized according to its content and addressee.

Results: In total, six relevant articles were obtained from the literature research. 67 institutions were contacted. 47 replied. Out of those 16 had guidelines available. Eleven had guidelines in development. After reviewing the relevant literature and available guidelines, we identified eight recommendations for safe use of social networks in health care settings by pooling relevant and reoccurring elements. In contrast to most guidelines used by health care providers which focus mainly on legal aspects such as online defamation, main issues addressed by our guidelines are data privacy concerns and possible impacts of befriending with patients. We suggest that health care providers carefully review their online behavior and are aware of which content they share. Befriending might have a great impact on the patient-physician relationship, therefore we find it crucial to either limit befriending or ensure that date privacy settings are applied to avoid those connections to become public.

Conclusion: Our guidelines provide orientation for physicians who want to use social media as a platform to communicate with their patients. The issues address several aspects of online behavior which should be followed by everyone in the health-care sector. Doing so will allow to benefit from the possibilities social networks offer without the danger of being subject to legal charges or ethical dilemmas.