• Revenue Cycle Management
  • COVID-19
  • Reimbursement
  • Diabetes Awareness Month
  • Risk Management
  • Patient Retention
  • Staffing
  • Medical Economics® 100th Anniversary
  • Coding and documentation
  • Business of Endocrinology
  • Telehealth
  • Physicians Financial News
  • Cybersecurity
  • Cardiovascular Clinical Consult
  • Locum Tenens, brought to you by LocumLife®
  • Weight Management
  • Business of Women's Health
  • Practice Efficiency
  • Finance and Wealth
  • EHRs
  • Remote Patient Monitoring
  • Sponsored Webinars
  • Medical Technology
  • Billing and collections
  • Acute Pain Management
  • Exclusive Content
  • Value-based Care
  • Business of Pediatrics
  • Concierge Medicine 2.0 by Castle Connolly Private Health Partners
  • Practice Growth
  • Concierge Medicine
  • Business of Cardiology
  • Implementing the Topcon Ocular Telehealth Platform
  • Malpractice
  • Influenza
  • Sexual Health
  • Chronic Conditions
  • Technology
  • Legal and Policy
  • Money
  • Opinion
  • Vaccines
  • Practice Management
  • Patient Relations
  • Careers

AMA adopts new social media policy

Article

The American Medical Association has adopted a new policy in an effort to help physicians maintain a positive online presence and preserve the integrity of the patient-physician relationship.

The American Medical Association (AMA) has adopted a new policy in an effort to help physicians maintain a positive online presence and preserve the integrity of the patient-physician relationship.

"Using social media can help physicians create a professional presence online, express their personal views, and foster relationships, but it can also create new challenges for the patient-physician relationship," said Mary Anne McCaffree, MD, an AMA board member. "The AMA's new policy outlines a number of considerations physicians should weigh when building or maintaining a presence online."

The new policy, adopted in November at the organization's semi-annual policy-making meeting in San Diego, encourages physicians to:

use privacy settings to safeguard personal information and content to the fullest extent possible on social networking sites;

routinely monitor their own Internet presence to ensure that the personal and professional information on their own sites-and content posted about them by others-is accurate and appropriate;

maintain appropriate boundaries of the patient-physician relationship when interacting with patients online and ensure patient privacy and confidentiality is maintained;

consider separating personal and professional content online; and

recognize that actions online and content posted can negatively affect their reputations among patients and colleagues and may even have consequences for their medical careers.

Related Videos
Kyle Zebley headshot
Kyle Zebley headshot
Kyle Zebley headshot
Michael J. Barry, MD
Hadi Chaudhry, President and CEO, CareCloud
Claire Ernst, JD, gives expert advice
Arien Malec