healthcare and social media

I am fascinated by how social media, such as facebook, twitter, delicious etc, and the internet can be used in healthcare. I have my own facebook page - do join facebook , look me up and join as a friend where I am happy to talk to you - comment on this blog, or email me direct at pmyellowlees@ucdavis.edu. To give you an example of the internet and healthcare - a woman from many hundreds of miles away in California phoned me yesterday for advice about her mother who had a major behavioral problem - she had found me on the internet via my website - http://www.informationagehealth.com/ - and had then followed the links from there to check me out. We had a good short discussion and I was able to advise her on the best approach to take with her mom. But what interested me is that she had not problem checking me out online, and then finding my phone number to speak to me direct - she knew that I was a relevant expert and would be able to help her if she could contact me - and none of this would have been possible had I not had an obvious internet profile. So let me ask all of you to comment - do you have stories of how the internet has helped you for healthcare - and in particular how the social media sites have helped? Do contact me and tell me - I am fascinated. Thanks indeed.

Remember that you can also find other examples of how to use the internet for healthcare in my book "Your health in the information age - how you and your doctor can use the internet to work together" available through Amazon and most online booksellers, as well as at www.informationagehealth.com. The eBook short version is available through www.smashwords.com if you want to download it to your pda or iPhone.