How to Tackle Professionalism and Social Media as a Healthcare Professional
Key takeaways:
Social media is a great way to expand your professional network and engage with others.
For those in the healthcare industry, maintaining professional and ethical standards online is absolutely essential.
Be aware that certain types of online behavior can lead to serious repercussions at work, and they may even have legal consequences.
Social media has connected us in ways we could have never imagined. The explosive popularity of websites and apps like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok has transformed culture across the world for people of all ages.
Strategies for social media are now a centerpiece of company business plans, and there’s a strong push among employees to develop an “online presence” and “network with others.” But it’s not always clear what that may mean in terms of career development — especially for healthcare professionals and health organizations.
To add to these pressures, social media adds a new dimension to the meaning of professionalism in healthcare. And here’s the hard truth: Mishandling it can potentially derail your career or even lead to legal troubles. In today’s environment, it’s essential that healthcare providers understand what it means to uphold ethical and professional standards on social media.
Instant Rx savings for insured and uninsured patients
GoodRx for HCPs has savings that can beat insurance copays and reduce your need to complete prior authorizations.
GoodRx is NOT insurance. GoodRx Health information and resources are reviewed by our editorial staff with medical and healthcare policy and pricing experience. See our editorial policy for more detail. We also provide access to services offered by GoodRx and our partners when we think these services might be useful to our visitors. We may receive compensation when a user decides to leverage these services, but making them available does not influence the medical content our editorial staff provides.
Free speech online
One of the typical ways employees can get into social media trouble with their managers is to say or post things online that are offensive or inappropriate. This issue is not unique to healthcare, of course, and there are lots of cases of people encountering professional trouble as a result of their online activity.
Here are some facts to keep in mind:
One survey found that 34% of employers had reprimanded or fired staff for social media posts.
While estimates vary, one survey found that 90% of employers consider social media when hiring candidates. And 79% had denied a position to a candidate because of inappropriate content on social platforms.
Another small survey found that 60% of Board of Pharmacy respondents said that their board had been involved in a complaint regarding the online conduct of a licensee.
According to the Society for Human Resource Management, companies can generally terminate people for making comments online that are considered racist, threatening, or damaging to the company’s clients or create a hostile or unsafe workplace
In certain cases, speaking out online can indeed be considered free speech. Three criteria must be met for a post to be protected:
You are speaking as a private citizen.
The speech pertains to a matter of public concern, such as a social, political, or community matter.
Your interest in speaking freely outweighs a government employer’s interest in efficiently fulfilling its public services.
But even if your employer can’t legally discipline or fire you for exercising your right to free speech, as a healthcare professional, it’s still worth asking yourself these questions:
What am I, or anyone else, going to gain with this post?
What could I, or anyone else, lose from this post?
Rather than sharing this publicly to blow off steam, could I talk about it privately with a trusted friend or family member?
How would this post affect my chances of future employment?
Well-intended posts gone wrong
Even if your post might not be deemed offensive by anyone, it still may land in hot water with your employer. Take this case of a nurse who had a change of heart about vaccines, after years of being active in online, anti-vaccine communities.
In this case, she found herself caring for a toddler who had contracted measles and landed in the intensive care unit (ICU). As a result, she felt moved to post about her experiences online, saying: “For the first time in my career I saw measles this week. Actually, most of my coworkers and the ER docs saw measles for the first time as well. And honestly, it was rough. The kid was super sick — sick enough to be admitted to the ICU, and he looked miserable. You couldn’t touch him without him crying or moaning in pain. It was terrible. I think it’s easy for us nonvaxxers to make assumptions about these diseases, but most of us have never and will never see one of them.”
That may sound innocent enough, even altruistic in an attempt to convince parents to take their children to get their vaccines. However, the parent of another patient admitted to that hospital saw the post, took a picture of it, and posted it to the hospital’s Facebook page with concerns that her child had been exposed to measles. The hospital responded by putting the nurse on probation, then firing her after an investigation, citing the privacy rule under HIPAA, as well as hospital policy.
While it’s difficult to determine if this is a true violation of the HIPAA privacy rule without more details on the case — considering she did not post the patient’s identifying information — most states are at-will employment states that allow employers to terminate employment for any lawful reason, which can include a violation of their policy.
Just as with the potentially offensive posts, the key here is to think carefully before you post. In this example, it’s possible the parent of this child would have been a willing spokesperson for vaccination after her child had recovered.
In addition, the nurse might have been able to coordinate with the hospital’s marketing and communications department to publish a piece interviewing the mother (with her permission, of course) and discussing the importance of vaccination. At that point, she could have then shared a public piece on the anti-vaccine forums, and it would have all been public information.
Handling patient connections
While what you post may be completely in your control, a stickier situation can arise when patients want to “friend” or “connect” with you on social media.
Remember, no matter what, that online chats and social platforms may not be used to transmit protected health information (PHI) — which could easily be considered a violation of the security rule under HIPAA. Any medical questions the patient has can be handled through phone calls or secure messaging in the EMR system.
It’s also worth asking these questions before accepting a friend request:
Does my employer’s policy allow for this or have a position on it?
Do either I or my patient stand to benefit from this request?
Am I OK blurring the line between my personal and professional circles? After all, having a large group of family, friends, and patients seeing my posts makes it more difficult to separate work from personal life.
It’s also not a great idea to send a friend request to a patient. Sending a request to your patient is not only unprofessional, but it could be regarded as a violation of the privacy rule under HIPAA. After all, you have privileged information through your relationship as their caregiver. Using that information to find them on social media is clearly not an acceptable use.
Lastly, if you’re concerned about patients seeing you on social networks, you can always change your privacy settings in your accounts to make your account more difficult to find.
The bottom line
Social media presents distinct challenges to the healthcare professional. By following these tips, you can avoid trouble with employers, boards, and others while maintaining a presence online that projects your best self.
The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists and the American Medical Association also have written position statements on the use of social media by healthcare professionals that provide valuable guidelines.
Why trust our experts?
