Over two hundred e-savvy citizens were in attendance at last week’s evening public forum “Social Media: The Good, the Bad and the Possible” to learn more on how social media can be used to improve their own health and wellness.
The public forum was put on as part of a Peter Wall Institute Exploratory Workshop on Harnessing the Social Web – Communities for Health and Wellness spear headed by Dr. Kendall Ho – Director at the eHealth Strategy Office – along with a group of researchers from five faculties and school at the University of British Columbia, including the Faculty of Medicine, the iSchool@UBC, the School of Nursing, the Faculty of Applied Sciences and the Sauder School of Business.
The evening brought digital and health care experts, researchers, dignitaries, and the public together to have a conversation around the important questions surrounding social media in health and medicine. The Honorable John Yap, Minister of Advanced Education, Innovation and Technology and Minister Responsible for Multiculturalism, brought greetings on behalf of the provincial government and spoke to the importance of online platforms in facilitating citizen engagement in health and medicine. “Social media spreads knowledge, informs and educates. Social media, in its many forms, is empowering people,” commented the Hon. John Yap. “The government is using various social media tools to get citizens involved and engaged in the decisions we make. It’s important to explore what role social media can play in improving lives and engaging communities.”
Moderated by Gillian Shaw, digital life writer for the Vancouver Sun, a panel of expert speakers from the Centre for eHealth Global Innovation, the Pan-American Health Organization WHO, Hoot Suite, and the UBC Biomdedical Library prompted interesting discussions both in-person and online with over 861 tweets, 140 participants and over 888,000 impressions following the #HCSMForum hashtag on Twitter. The event was also streamed live via webcast to engage interesting audiences across BC and beyond.
This widespread public involvement and interest is exactly what Dr. Ho and his colleagues hope to encourage and explore.“We need to engage the general public, health professionals, researchers, and innovators to work together to unleash the power of social media and modern information technologies”, says Dr. Ho. “Proper research and evaluation can help us understand how these new and exciting approaches can truly help us live healthier lives, and to improve our health system’s ability and capacity to support each of us in wellness and sickness alike.”
You can view the webcast of the event at
http://mediasitemob1.mediagroup.ubc.ca/Mediasite/Play/5965d72bcfaa426cb8843208c7bb037e1d
The top social media and health focused resources can be found here
http://ehealth.med.ubc.ca/harnessingthesocialweb/
View more photos from the event here
http://flic.kr/ps/218tEJ
