Social media: a brave new world for doctors.

The importance of social media is becoming increasingly recognized in the health care sector, and there are now thousands of social media Web sites devoted to health care issues. Nevertheless, tension continues to exist as to how and for what purposes such social media can be used by health care providers. Advocates of social media extol its benefit, but privacy concerns, of both patients and entities, and other medicolegal considerations, continue to be hurdles. In this article, I explore some of the concerns and limitations that health care providers face in establishing social media Web sites such as Facebook, Twitter, or individual blogs.