Psychiatrists want to be logged on but we’re nervous : The need to teach our residents how to navigate new media

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Psychiatrists want to be logged on but we’re nervous : The need to teach our residents how to navigate new media Aaron Reichlin M.D. and GauravaAgarwal M.D Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago IL A Survey of Psychiatrists Use of 24 hour Connectivity, Text and Instant Messages with patients and providers (Sample questions) I have received or sent electronic correspondence, such as friend requests or messages via a social networking site from a patient I have felt uncomfortable about communicating with patients electronically I have had a patient share or ask me about things of my personal life based on what they learned of me on the internet I worry about electronic content from patients because of privacy issues Do you think it would be useful to have a professional guidelines on how to use electronic media in psychiatric practice Do you think that you should be able to charge patients for electronically communicated treatment recommendations Do you own or are you a member of any of the following. Check all that apply: Gmail ,G-chat ,I-Phone, Blackberry, "Regular" Cell phone, Twitter, Facebook ,Myspace ,Friendster ,LinkedIn ,AOL Instant Messaging Do you think that being a psychiatrist has limited your desire/ability to use certain electronic media that may have enriched your personal or professional life For example, dating sites, social networking, advertising Have you ever brought material you learned about a patient electronically into the session Examples include sexuality, substance abuse, social contacts, professional contacts • Results: Patient and Psychiatrist Interactions • 17% of Psychiatrists report that they have brought patient material they learned about electronically into their sessions • 21% of Psychiatrists have had their patients ask them about their personal lives based on information the patient’s learned online • No Psychiatrists report that they have had to act emergently based on information learned electronically/digitally about a patient • Introduction • •Psychiatry has placed special emphasis on privacy, neutrality, and professional boundaries that has led to fairly strict practice • guidelines in the past. Now we are lagging behind in providing guidance to our practioners about the ways to stay mindful in a • changing landscape of communication options. • • We hypothesized that the lack of guidelines was unlikely to prevent psychiatrists from using some of the • next generation of media including smart phones, social and professional networking sites, and chatting platforms,. However • we also felt that many psychiatrists would feel uneasy about navigating these new media appropriately. • • We set out to find the answers to several questions: • What sites are psychiatrists going to in this new world of multimedia and what are they using to get there? • Are the conflicted about being there? • Do they want help navigating these territories? • Are they finding that this multimedia has led them to have interactions with patients outside of the office? • • Our hope was that we could begin to use the answers to these questions to assess the need for the development of a • curriculum that will provide a new set of guidelines to help protect psychiatrists in the future as they use this new technology to • enrich both their personal and professional lives • Results concerning the worry and uncertainty experienced by psychiatrists while using new media as assessed by Likert scales 2. Methods Online Survey created (Sample questions shown) IRB approval sought and granted Email sent to Illinois Psychiatric Society members and Illinois Psychiatric Residency Programs with survey • Conclusions • It was our aim to assess the use of new media by psychiatrists and if this use was blurring the lines between our professional offices • and personal time. We found that indeed psychiatrists had embraced new media to communicate, but in a field where communication is • central to our function, it is not surprising that new forms of communication need new guidelines to ensure that values we have • held in our field are preserved, and practioners and patients are protected. • Key Findings: • • 88% of respondents responded “maybe or yes” to whether psychiatrists should be able to be compensated for electronic communications • with patients, which would likely necessitate very stringent guidelines about this type of media • • Despite reporting feeling somewhat limited in the amount of electronic media that they can use due to their career choice, • 76% of respondents are currently using electronic media BEYOND a “regular” cell phone and plain email. • • Given 76% of psychiatrists are using next generation multimedia, it is disconcerting that more often than not we are not spending • time in our sessions establishing boundaries around this electronic communication. The implications of this are potentially • damaging both professionally and personally as it is easy to envision 24 hour connectivity causing significant burnout and boundary • violations • • 81% say they would welcome guidelines on how to safely use these media • Results: More recent graduates are using different technology than older graduates Acknowledgements Dr. Joan Anzia and the entire Northwestern Psychiatry Residency Program The Goldberg Fellowship Disclosures Drs Reichlin and Agarwal have no disclosures to report