Twitter for Healthcare … 50 Million tweets and counting

On: 04-26-2012 With: 99 Comments By: Thomas M. Lee, B.S., NHA

Health, whether our own or that of someone close to us, carries a high level of importance, interest, and ultimately common ground. And because of that we tend to talk about it. We seek knowledge and support. And with the rise of healthcare social media our ability connect with those who share our desire to converse and learn from one another has opened up amazing possibilities. Enter Twitter for healthcare.

Communities connecting via Twitter for healthcare

Twitter is certainly one of the easiest social media platforms out there on which to find and connect with individuals who share our interests. That’s because it’s largely an open platform. One that encourages connecting with people who we otherwise may never have known. And that holds true when you consider Twitter for healthcare. However, healthcare has an incredibly diverse presence on Twitter because of the many specialized needs that exist … each with issues that are uniquely their own.

We launched the Healthcare Hashtag Project eighteen months ago with the intent of helping to lower the barriers to using Twitter for healthcare interests. From the start it was intended as being a way of finding the conversations relevant to your own health interests, to discover who the thought leaders are, and above all to engage and contribute to conversations and discovery.

In that time we’ve seen advocates, providers, and patients alike flock to the project, provide us with numerous inspiring ideas, and contribute many new healthcare hashtags that have helped to facilitate the expansion of engagement and the birth of new online healthcare communities.

Twitter grants special permission to the Healthcare Hashtag Project

The Healthcare Hashtag project doesn’t rely on the standard data that’s available from Twitter. We’ve gained “elevated” privileges to the the Twitter Stream API from them. Thus, we’re able to track many more hashtags than we otherwise would have been able to. So let’s not forget to give a nod and a “thank you” to Twitter for helping the healthcare community to flourish on their platform.

Why should I use Twitter for healthcare exploration and engagement?

twitter for healthcare - the community by the numbers

At the Healthcare Hashtag Project the community contributions and the expanding role of Twitter in healthcare have resulted in a captured conversation that just recently crossed the 50 million tweet threshold! That’s 50 million individual pieces of healthcare information shared. And it’s now at a level to where it’s growing at a rate of over 1 million healthcare related tweets per week. Too much for you to keep track of? No worries, we’ve got a complete, free transcript service that allows you to retrieve all of them. Just check out one of our individual hashtag pages to get the twitter transcript for that hashtag within the date parameters you specify.

Want more evidence that Twitter is one of the leading social media platforms for healthcare? Explore the project yourself. And once you do, I hope that you’ll be inspired to contribute to the ever expanding healthcare conversation taking place on Twitter via the use of healthcare hashtags. Let your voice be heard … and tune in to the many other voices who are sharing as well.

Twitter for healthcare is alive and well.

Categories: Shorts Tags: healthcare social media, healthcare twitter, The Healthcare Hashtag Project, twitter, twitter for doctors

About the Author

Thomas M. Lee, B.S., NHA – @tmlfoxConsultant to the Healthcare Industry. 30+ yrs experience in healthcare business operations. Acute care, skilled nursing, physician practice, and outpatient therapy. Partner at Symplur & The Fox Group. Passionate about healthcare social media. +

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