We marketing types are quick to encourage docs to participate in just about anything, and here’s another with which you’re probably already familiar: social networking.

Not surprisingly, it’s a challenge to teach the old dogs which tricks are professionally appropriate, and which will make them the subject of a prime-time “Predator” exposé.

Eric T. Berkman, writing for the Massachusetts Medical Law recommends that physicians in the burgeoning 45 to 54 age bracket of participating in social networks maintain the following guidelines:

• Keep strict patient-physician boundaries in place online
  (patients are not always your “Friends” on Facebook)
• Maintain patient confidentiality with vague detail
• Understand that despite a nom de plume, anonymity is unlikely
• Be suspicious of anonymous advice given freely

Interestingly, even the medical-legal landscape is under review, as Facebook users number more than 300 million, juries who “see Facebook as the new email” (according to a younger relative of the Prognosis) have yet to set much of a precedent. They may see online presence as necessary and its negligent participation as legally liable.

And we all know how respondents feel about excess liability.

http://mamedicallaw.com/blog/2009/10/19/social-networking-101-for-physicians/