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Social Innovation at HIMSS

Another HIMSS conference is in the books.  Last week over 31,000 Health IT professionals and nearly 1,000 vendors descended on Orlando to discuss the latest industry trends.  Once you got past all the pageantry and hoopla, there were meaningful discussion, debate, and education around the intersection of technology and healthcare.  In particular, mobile health, health data exchange and the role of accountable care organizations seemed to dominate the conversation. 

The conference provided a great opportunity for members of the Health IT community to connect and share success stories along with continuing challenges.  The energy of the crowd was tremendous and it's genuinely inspiring to see so many committed souls all focused on the same goal: improving the efficiency of health care delivery and patient outcomes through the adoption and meaningful use of technology.  For a great recap on all the action at HIMSS, check out Neil Versel's post on The Healthcare Blog.

I'll remember HIMSS 2011 as the year mobile went mainstream.  Everyone I met was either using an iPad or giving them away in drawings (guilty on both counts).  While Apple's device was ubiquitous, I came away even more impressed by the Blackberry PlayBook, which was being previewed in both the Blackberry and Sprint booths.  With its support for multitasking and Flash, its compact design and faster processor speed, the PlayBook may actually live up to its billing as "enterprise ready" and it certainly demonstrated its ability to rock web-based rich-media applications like OzmosisESP. 

If Blackberry is smart they will rush the PlayBook to stores this month before the iPad2 grabs all the headlines, which might already be too late since Steve Job's announcement earlier today said the all new iPad2 will be released March 11th.

Getting back to HIMSS, the highlight of the conference for the Ozmosis team was undoubtedly the New Media Meetup we co-sponsored with MEDecision.  Along with the events at the Social Media Pavilion, it provided a great opportunity to mingle and learn from other's in the social media space.  After thousands of tweets and blog posts among a star studded group, the Meetup led to more in-depth conversations and debate regarding the continuing role social collaboration will play in health care.  

This video of the New Media Meetup taken by Gregg Masters shows the diehards who stayed to the very end. I also want to congratulate the entire HIMSS new media team for making "social" a critical part of the #HIMSS11 experience.  With so much happening simultaneously in an exhibit hall that literally spanned a mile, it was little surprise that Twitter was simply the best way to hear about the most interesting news and events.

However, even with all the energy and exuberance at HIMSS, I believe the social media message itself needs to be re-focused.  Its time to shift the conversation from how hospitals and life science firms can use social media as a marketing and communications tool to how we should be leveraging social tools to support and improve the clinical workflow itself. 

Just this week we saw another case study decrying how hospitals across the United States are not using Facebook to its capacity to build hospital brands.  As much as I love Facebook, I wish organizations would avoid falling into its trap.  There is no patient privacy or data security on open social sites like Facebook and Twitter, which means neither patients or providers will ever engage in a meaningful discussion in such a setting. Hospitals and life science firms need to realize that the only way they will truly engage their patients and clinical staff is by integrating "social" into their traditional enterprise business processes and systems. 

Brand building and patient engagement are terrific applications of social media for hospitals and health systems, but social tools can play a far more significant role in the healthcare delivery process.  However, those institutions that believe they have reached the pinnacle of social utopia because they have five thousand facebook fans are missing out on a far greater opportunity.  Instead, they should look to innovators, such as Indiana University Health where Radiology residents are now using social software to communicate and collaborate around clinical topics. 

As we have said before on this blog, by integrating social tools into the clinical workflow we can ultimately enhance productivity and produce better clinical outcomes.  So let's stop confusing "social media', which can be a wonderful marketing vehicle when used appropriately to provide valued information and customer service, with the "social tools" that are being used to improve care team coordination, accelerate clinical research and support the adoption of electronic medical records and computerized physician order entry systems. They are not one in the same.