What Is the Current State of Physician Utilization of Social Networking for Emergency Medicine Board Certification Preparation?
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Abstract
Due to the unique demands of the their practice, Emergency Physicians (EPs) have historically been early-adopters of technology and innovations that improve efficiency and collaboration. There are numerous examples of EPs using YouTube and Twitter to disseminate new ideas and novel approaches to problems frequently encountered in Emergency Medicine without the prolonged publication cycle of traditional journals. We will examine another example of EPs harnessing the power of social media for good as they prepare for board certification examinations.
The ideal preparation for board certification is asynchronous, accurate, high-yield, and both time- and cost-efficient. Social media is sufficiently flexible to meet all of these requirements, and we are seeing an increasing trend in EP adoption of social media, particularly Twitter, to provide and utilize board review content. Many individuals and residency programs serve both as generators and consumers of this content, and numerous residency programs encourage their residents to create high-yield board review content as part of a structured curriculum that benefits the resident generating the content, the program’s other residents, and EPs around the country. Innovative board review programs are also providing free board review content via social networking to attract consumers to their products. The open public format allows for sufficient curation of information and is efficient from the physician perspective.
As EPs and other physicians increasingly utilize social media to prepare for board examinations, and as residency programs push their residents to engage in social media, we will need to evaluate whether this asynchronous online or social media-based learning is superior—or at least not inferior—to other methods of learning. At the very least, the ubiquity of services like Twittter and other online social networks will ensure that information is available to all interested entities and that medicine continues to move forward in a collaborative manner.
The ideal preparation for board certification is asynchronous, accurate, high-yield, and both time- and cost-efficient. Social media is sufficiently flexible to meet all of these requirements, and we are seeing an increasing trend in EP adoption of social media, particularly Twitter, to provide and utilize board review content. Many individuals and residency programs serve both as generators and consumers of this content, and numerous residency programs encourage their residents to create high-yield board review content as part of a structured curriculum that benefits the resident generating the content, the program’s other residents, and EPs around the country. Innovative board review programs are also providing free board review content via social networking to attract consumers to their products. The open public format allows for sufficient curation of information and is efficient from the physician perspective.
As EPs and other physicians increasingly utilize social media to prepare for board examinations, and as residency programs push their residents to engage in social media, we will need to evaluate whether this asynchronous online or social media-based learning is superior—or at least not inferior—to other methods of learning. At the very least, the ubiquity of services like Twittter and other online social networks will ensure that information is available to all interested entities and that medicine continues to move forward in a collaborative manner.
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