There is a new article published in the International Journal of Medical Informatics about Junior physician’s use of Web 2.0 for information seeking and medical education: A qualitative study.

Web 2.0 internet tools and methods have attracted considerable attention as a means to improve health care delivery. Despite evidence demonstrating their use by medical professionals, there is no detailed research describing how Web 2.0 influences physicians’ daily clinical practice. Hence this study examines Web 2.0 use by 35 junior physicians in clinical settings to further understand their impact on medical practice.

CONCLUSION: Web 2.0 use represents a profound departure from previous learning and decision processes which were normally controlled by senior medical staff or medical schools. There is widespread concern with the risk of poor quality information with Web 2.0 use, and the manner in which physicians are using it suggest effective use derives from the mitigating actions by the individual physician. Three alternative policy options are identified to manage this risk and improve efficiency in Web 2.0’s use.

I launched the world’s first university course focusing on web 2.0 and medicine for medical and dentistry students. The third semester will begin this September. I asked all of my students to fill a survey before and after the course so then I could somehow see how their attitude changed during the course.

I have a lot of data, but much less time and I have never written a publication in such a field. If you want to join, let’s make it a collaborative project. Please drop me a line (berci.mesko at gmail.com) if you are interested.

PS: How could we expect physicians to be web-savvy or to meet the expectations of e-patients if they are not educated properly to do so? That is where my course is meant to enter the process…