Talk to early career health researchers, UK

1. Blogging, tweeting, sharing your work
to reach policy makers
UCL Early Careers Network 22 April 2015
Dr Trish Groves
Head of research, The BMJ
& Editor-in-chief, BMJ Open

4. Applications that build on ideological & technological foundations of
Web 2.0 & allow creation & exchange of user-generated content
(Alqvist T et al, 2008)
Interactions in which people create, share, & exchange information &
ideas in virtual communities & networks (Kaplan AM, Haenlein M,
2010)
Information tools that both exploit & celebrate our social nature
(Coiera E, BMJ 2013)
So what are social media?

5. @bmj_latest/twitter 170k followers
https://www.facebook.com/thebmjdotcom
38,880 likes

6. http://doc2doc.bmj.com/

8. How to be social

9. http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/
Twitter Guide Sept 2011
Free to use and share

10. • setting up your Twitter account
• useful Twitter terminology
• tweeting styles
• building up your followers
• resources
• using Twitter:
• for research projects
• in departments
• alongside blogging
• in teaching
Tips for academics
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/files/2011/11/Published-
Twitter_Guide_Sept_2011.pdf

11. Anatomy of a tweet
blog
journal

12. An author’s tweet

14. • tweet links to articles, blogs, web pages
• use # to link tweets and make them searchable
• use Twitter buttons on web pages and browser headers
• save some of 140 characters for comments when retweeted
• live tweet conferences and other open meetings:
• conference #
• tweet speaker biographies/web pages/blogs/papers
• use tweetreach to see how far tweets about a # have spread
• use Storify to curate tweets
Tweetastic tips

16. https://youtu.be/Rwzhg-FqPXg

17. http://blogs.bmj.com/bmj-journals-development-blog/2014/04/14/what-does-
social-media-add-to-conferences/

18. Social media and
impact of research

19. http://melissaterras.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/what-happens-when-you-tweet-
open-access.html Prof M Terras, UCL

20. Eysenbach G. Can Tweets Predict Citations? Metrics of Social Impact Based on Twitter and
Correlation with Traditional Metrics of Scientific Impact. J Med Internet Res 2011;13(4):e123
DOI: 10.2196/jmir.2012
Top-cited articles can be predicted from top-tweeted articles with
93% specificity and 75% sensitivity.
Tweets can predict highly cited articles within the first 3 days of
article publication.
Social media activity either increases citations or reflects the
underlying qualities of the article that also predict citations, but the
true use of these metrics is to measure the distinct concept of social
impact. Social impact measures based on tweets are proposed to
complement traditional citation metrics.

21. Haufstein S et al. Tweeting biomedicine: An analysis of tweets and citations in the biomedical
literature. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology
Volume 65, Issue 4, pages 656–669, April 2014 DOI: 10.1002/asi.23101
Analysis based on 1.4 million documents covered by both PubMed
and Web of Science between 2010 and 2012.
The number of tweets containing links to these documents compared
to citations to evaluate degree to which certain journals, disciplines,
and specialties were represented on Twitter and how far tweets
correlate with citation impact.
With less than 10% of PubMed articles mentioned on Twitter, its
uptake is low in general but differs between journals and specialties.
Correlations between tweets and citations are low, implying that
impact metrics based on tweets are different from those based on
citations.

22. Grande D et al. Translating Research For Health Policy: Researchers’ Perceptions
And Use Of Social Media. Health Affairs July 2014 doi:10.1377/hlthaff.2014.0300
Survey of 325 health policy researchers registered for 2013
Academy Health Annual Research Meeting.
About using social media v traditional media + direct outreach to
disseminate research findings to policy makers.
Researchers rated social media lowest in three domains:
researchers’ confidence in their ability to use the method, peers’
respect for its use, and how it is perceived in academic promotion.
Just 14% reported tweeting, and 21% reported blogging about
their research or related health policy in the past year.
Researchers described social media as being incompatible with
research, of high risk professionally, of uncertain efficacy, and an
unfamiliar technology that they did not know how to use.

23. Tweeting as a doctor:
be careful

24. General Medical Council social media policy covers:
• blogs and microblogs (Twitter)
• internet forums (doctors.net, Doc2Doc)
• content communities (Youtube, Flickr)
• social networking sites (Facebook, LinkedIn)
GMC: Good Medical Practice 2013

25. http://www.gmc-uk.org/Doctors__use_of_social_media.pdf_51448306.pdf

26. Key points in GMC guidance on
doctors’ use of social media

27. Date of download:
6/3/2013
Copyright © The American College of Physicians.
All rights reserved.
From: Online Medical Professionalism: Patient and Public Relationships: Policy Statement From the American College of
Physicians and the Federation of State Medical Boards
Ann Intern Med. 2013;158(8):620-627. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-158-8-201304160-00100

28. Thanks
@trished
tgroves@bmj.com
pinterest.com/trishedpin