Healthcare Social Media Jobs

Twitter. Blogs. YouTube. Facebook. Ustream.tv. If you’re a healthcare professional who not only knows what those social media tools are but how to use them, there’s a new, growing and hip position out there to consider.

Social media managers have come of age in healthcare. The jobs pay from the $30,000s to $70,000s, depending on your background and what’s involved. You may work alone, or in a team. Your hard-won clinical training is a huge plus, but you’ll also need to be media savvy and a promoter.

Social media helps the entire healthcare system internally and externally, says Lee Aase, director of Mayo Clinic’s Center for Social Media in Rochester, Minn. Once a job incorporated into a staffer’s other work, social media management at the Mayo Clinic now is handled by eight staffers in Arizona, Florida and Minnesota.

Social media gamut

From sending tweets and posting blog updates about natural disasters, to recruiting patients for studies and helping researchers connect, there’s really almost no end for the uses of healthcare social media.

For example, Swedish Medical Center in Seattle uses social media in operating rooms and clinics. In 2010, the hospital used Twitter to broadcast a robot-assisted surgery to promote kidney health awareness. Later that year, the center broadcast the world’s first-ever social media “Sleep Up,” a live video stream of a patient’s sleep-disorder testing that included questions and answers with doctors via Ustream.tv and Twitter.

Social media managers also know who can field a medical question posted by a community resident, and managers can guide physicians and other providers in video streams and how to use tweets – or not.

“What most [managers] do is provide training to these really smart people who we trust with narcotics and sharp surgical instruments about the [social media] ground rules and how we need to do this,” Aase says. “We don’t want to create a burden of process that stops people from interacting. These tools break down barriers that we don’t want to put back up.”

Managers needed

Aase predicts that as more organizations see the benefits of social media management, more will designate an employee “who has their finger on the pulse and can marshal other resources of the organization.”

Swedish social media manager Dana Lewis’ job ranges from writing tweets to coordinating live streams to coaching the chief executive officer on tactical production aspects and strategy.

“One of the reasons I’ve been successful and my job has grown is because we have looked at social media as how healthcare is changing,” says Lewis, who founded “#HCSM” (Healthcare Communications & Social Media) on Twitter to give healthcare providers, students, patients and communicators a venue for discussing social media’s healthcare role.

For new nursing grads struggling in a dismal job market or media-savvy older nurses looking for a change of pace, this type of work could be just the right fit.

“Definitely someone who has medical expertise could find ways to productively do this,” Aase says. “These are very powerful communications tools and if you have knowledge that you’re able to harness through these tools, they work.”

Strategy, strategy

Lewis adds a caveat. You’ll need to be strategic and insightful, and be aware of the healthcare organization’s culture, she says.

“They have to identify the needs and how these tools will meet the needs,” Lewis says. “So they can really take their [clinical training] and tie it in with tools. Nursing grads could shape this with the marketing and communications team.”

Above all, don’t be shy. It is, as Lewis puts it, “A new world out there.”