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Article
Can social media be used as a hospital quality improvement tool?
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  • Tara Lagu, MD, Baystate Health
  • Sarah Goff, MD, Baystate Health
  • Benjamin Craft, Baystate Health
  • Stephanie Calcasola, Baystate Health
  • Evan Benjamin, MD, Baystate Health
  • Aruna Priya, Baystate Health
  • Peter Lindenauer, MD, Baystate Health
Document Type
Article, Peer-reviewed
Publication Date
1-1-2016
Abstract

Many hospitals wish to improve their patients' experience of care. To learn whether social media could be used as a tool to engage patients and to identify opportunities for hospital quality improvement (QI), we solicited patients' narrative feedback on the Baystate Medical Center Facebook page during a 3-week period in 2014. Two investigators used directed qualitative content analysis to code comments and descriptive statistics to assess the frequency of selected codes and themes. We identified common themes, including: (1) comments about staff (17/37 respondents, 45.9%); (2) comments about specific departments (22/37, 59.5%); (3) comments on technical aspects of care, including perceived errors and inattention to pain control (9/37, 24.3%); and (4) comments describing the hospital physical plant, parking, and amenities (9/37, 24.3%). A small number (n = 3) of patients repeatedly responded, accounting for 30% (45/148) of narratives. Although patient feedback on social media could help to drive hospital QI efforts, any potential benefits must be weighed against the reputational risks, the lack of representativeness among respondents, and the volume of responses needed to identify areas of improvement.

PMID
26390277
Citation Information
Lagu T, Goff S, Craft B, Calcasola S, Benjamin E, Priya A, Lindenauer P. Can social media be used as a hospital quality improvement tool? J Hosp Med. 2016 Jan;11(1):52-5.