Stanford Medicine 2.0 Conference 2011 – The Report Card


Prajesh C., a member of the #hcsmanz community  recently attended and presented at the 4th World Congress on Social Media, Mobile Apps and Internet/Web 2.0 in Medicine, Health and Biomedical Research (Medicine 2.0) in Standford University in September. He has kindly provided us with his evaluation of the event.

Medicine 2.0 (2011) has been touted as the number one conference to attend for those working in the field of health and social media technologies. We have all experienced conferences, shows, expos etc. that have been touted as the “one to be at”, in this guest post, I will give an honest account of my thoughts about Medicine 2.0 and the key take home points from my perspective.

Stanford University provided the ideal setting for this conference, where the age-old profession of Medicine collided with the new “kid” on the block Social Media. The historic buildings and perfectly manicured grounds provided the ideal back drop for the innovative, creative and large number of thought leaders attracted to this conference.

Subject Grade Comments
Communication A+ Medicine 2.0 excelled in this area with Social Media providing an excellent medium of communication about the conference, this was through the #med2 tag which could be followed not only by conference attendees but also by a global audience. Communication from the organizing team was second to none.
Mathematics A+ Although there were more than 450 people at the conference, it felt like the number was not too big and not too small. The number of sessions available to attend was manageable and well spread out.
Social Studies A+ The setup of Medicine 2.0 allowed the interaction between thought leaders such as BJ Fogg, Susannah Fox, Jay Parkinson, Larry Chu, Jennifer Aaker etc. to happen in a seamless manner as each of them were very approachable and allowed for conversation to take place.
Music and effects A+ Each morning started with a lovely musical interlude with summit day almost feeling like a “rock concert”
Science A+ Any conference’s real merit is based on the scientific and academic rigor presented. Medicine 2.0 had a great global mix of strong scientific presentations, which perfectly complimented the practical applications that were presented at the summit.
Art A+ Visually the conference was very innovative with the use of QR Codes on name badges in order to link up people.
General comments:Key take home messages from my view

  • Social Media is not a new form of communication, it leverages off human innate need to be able to communicate and it allows this to take place on a more accessible and somewhat transparent medium. For healthcare it has allowed small pockets of communities and individuals to communicate with others forming a global community.
  • Social media in healthcare has also allowed the patient to transcend the doctors waiting room and examination office, by being well-informed both before seeing their doctor as well as after they have seen them. It also allows doctors to give patients more control of their healthcare plan, if social media is included appropriately into their healthcare plan.
  • Sussanah Fox spoke about the importance peer-to-peer interactions have in healthcare whilst BJ Fogg spoke about his principle of behaviour change. Both these two ideas complimented each other; peer-to-peer interactions should be seen as a method of implementing behaviour change.
  • Jennifer Aaker reminded us that we need to have a sense of humanity in everything we do. Emotion and empathy go a long way in turning  small changes into a global revolution.
  • We have been and will all be patients one day, so the doctor-patient relationship should be seen as a partnership and not as an ‘us against them’.
  • Sometimes it boils down to cost, but it doesn’t cost anything to show empathy.
  • Knowing what your body is doing can help you make better choices, this was the essence of the quantified self, knowing how you sleep, knowing your daily activity can help you manage your own health, whilst learning from a community.
Final Assessment:This conference certainly lived up to its claim as “the one conference you must attend this year”
Prajesh is a PhD candidate at the University of Otago. Having grown up in Zimbabwe, he completed his BSc in South Africa, and his MSc at the Univeristy of Otago. He is currently studying  how mobile phones and Social Network Sites are being used by Gen Y to share health information. His other areas of interest include health disparity and health literacy especially in underserved population groups, the role of every person in taking ownership of their health within the healthcare system.
He can be contacted at: pchhanabhai@infoscience.otago.ac.nz
His publications include:
Category : Innovation
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