Erik Jansen and Bart Brandenburg provided primary care medical consultations via Twitter under the account @tweetspreekuur. Over the course of a year they received 500 consultation tweets and DMs, consulting on a wide range of health issues. A survey found that most users were satisfied with the advice received and that a third would otherwise contact their general practitioner. While Twitter provided low-cost access to care, the consultations had limited overall impact on healthcare and the platform is not suitable for large-scale services due to reliability issues. The consultants aim to determine how best to expand telehealth services in the future.

1. http://www.flickr.com/photos/happy_sleepy/265376389
The proof of the pudding
First Results of a Primary Care Consultation Service on Twitter
Erik Jansen & Bart Brandenburg

2. Who we are

3. Erik almost could’t make it
because of a woman

4. How did we start?
Needs assesment?
Stakeholder analysis?
E-health readiness test?
Business plan?

5. http://www.flickr.com/photos/lucienengelen/4370288102
Reshape09
Nijmegen, 12th Octobre 2009

6. The next day
Erik got rather busy…
http://player.omroep.nl/?aflID=10209086

7. Where are we now?
data collected until 21st November 2010
1085followers
470public tweets
252following
66listed
Source: Volkskrant Banen 31st Octobre 2010

8. Numbers in perspective
0,0065 %of population of the Netherlands (16,7 million)
0,5 %of active Dutch Twitter accounts (est. 200.000)
Source: http://twittermania.nl/2010/07/onderzoek-bijna-200000-actieve-twitteraars-nederland/
We’re not in the top 1000of most followed Twitter accounts

9. What did we do?
± 500 @tweetspreekuur tweets received (est. some got lost)
470public tweets sent
584 DM’s received
564 DM’s sent
Source: downloaded tweets from http://twitter.com/tweetspreekuur
213people communicated with @tweetspreekuur
65 used the public timeline
105used secure direct messages 43used both

10. Some statistics
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Source: downloaded tweets from http://twitter.com/tweetspreekuur
rise & fall
of @tweetspreekuur
number of tweets per person varies from 1to 29
average number of tweets per person is 5,4the median is 4
36%consulted @tweetspreekuur more than once (max. 5x)

11. What did we tweet about?
0
5
10
15
20
25
ICPC analysis
of @tweetspreekuur
(Thanks Edith @Medicinfo!)
Source: downloaded tweets from http://twitter.com/tweetspreekuur
132 Direct Message episodes analysed so far (more to come)
Full rangeof primary care covered (every ICPC category)
Top 3 categories general, locomotion and skin

12. We wanted to know more
http://www.flickr.com/photos/54427426@N06/5038750096/

13. Who did we ask?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/spanishalex/4434628825/

14. How did you respond?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/toner/166570762

15. Some more statistics
Source: online survey @tweetspreekuur 2010
122 respondents 36% users 64% followers
average age 38,2
61%female 39%male
98% Dutch
32% chronic medication users
16%reports poor health
22% visit their general practitioner regularly

16. Even some more statistics
Source: online survey @tweetspreekuur 2010 and personal experience
Top 3 reasons for contact advice, reassurance and triage
1 episode led to a face to face contact (for a prescription)
1 episode led to a hospital visit by one of us
8 users sent pictures (skin related and one male genital organ)
8 episodes were followed by more extensive e-consultation

17. What if?
There was no @tweetspreekuur
http://www.flickr.com/photos/edgenewmedia/5200824497
34% would call GP
2% would call hospital

18. In comparison
age 38,2 40,6 53,0
what if 36% 43% 70%
satisfaction 8,0 7,8 8,6
Sources: Brandenburg et al Online survey @tweetspreekuur 2010
Nijland et al E-consultation research at Medicinfo 2009 & 2010
Derkx et al Telephone consultation research at Medicinfo 2010

19. Summing it all up
Pro
+ twitter provides easy access at very low cost
+ it is time efficient and great fun to do
+ good user satisfaction
Con
- Twitter is somewhat unreliable and unsuitable for larger scale
- So far our efforts have no effect on healthcare as a whole
- We can’t make money out of it (yet)

20. http://www.flickr.com/photos/happy_sleepy/265376389
The proof of the pudding
First Results of a Primary Care Consultation Service on Twitter
Erik Jansen & Bart Brandenburg
Back to pudding:
does it taste like more?

21. Where do we go from here?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/joannadabrowska/2153936925

22. Thank you everybody!
Tweetspreekuur http://twitter.com/tweetspreekuur
Erik Jansen http://twitter.com/janszoon
Bart Brandenburg http://twitter.com/bartbrandenburg