Huron Gastro now receives about 13 percent of its 500-plus weekly referrals through its Web site, the vast majority from fellow members of the Huron Valley Physicians Association who also use Medfusion connectivity services. The time savings for both referring practices and Huron Gastro are dramatic, says practice administrator Lana Cooper.

“When a practice phones in a referral to our scheduling department, it can count on a five- to 10-minute discussion, and that’s not counting any time spent on hold,” she says. “The referral management portal cuts down the time to a minute or less.”

The new frontier — social networking

Livingston had his epiphany about Internet social networking roughly four years ago when he was watching his daughter Jaclyn, then a high school student, navigating the MySpace site. At the time, he was lecturing in high schools on preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. “I realized that this is how kids were communicating with each other, and I didn’t know how to do it,” says Livingston.

So with the help of his daughter, Livingston created a MySpace profile page and gave out its address at his high school talks. “After one talk, 50 kids asked to be my friend on MySpace and asked a whole bunch of questions,” he says.

Livingston still has his MySpace page, but he also has a presence on Facebook, which has surpassed MySpace in popularity. Livingston’s practice Web site displays a link to his Facebook page (but not to his MySpace page), and vice versa.

When it comes to Facebook, he’s in good company. Everyone from the White House to the Mayo Clinic is showing their face there, hoping to reach the same Web-minded demographic. Livingston says some women who’ve discovered his practice on Facebook have become patients, and it’s easy to see why. His Facebook “wall,” where friends can post messages, is plastered with photos of babies that he and other MacArthur OB-GYNs have delivered, as well as numerous testimonials. One mother wrote: “Thank you so much, Dr. Livingston! You’re so awesome.” Like Facebook itself, this kind of marketing costs the practice nothing except the time it takes to manage the site.

While Facebook is a great place for patients to sing your praises, it’s not a great place for them to pose clinical questions and get answers back. Remember that little privacy law called HIPAA? “I’ve only had one time when a patient reached out to me this way and I had to reply that I couldn’t discuss her case,” he said. “I took down her post immediately. That’s why we’ve introduced secure messaging at our Web site, so we could communicate with patients legally.”

Livingston’s Web site has links to two other social networking hotspots. One is Shutterfly, a site for digital photos where MacArthur OB/Gyn maintains a gallery of baby snapshots. The other is Twitter, which lets Livingston compose and transmit messages, or tweets, no longer than 140 characters. Roughly 800 individuals — one-fourth of them patients — have signed up to receive these micro-blog entries from Livingston, who tweets not only on personal passions like Dallas Mavericks basketball, but also on new research on pregnancy and women’s health, and the debate over healthcare reform.

“There’s a ton of medical information on the Web, but much of it is unreliable,” he says. “If more doctors used Twitter, they could guide their patients to what’s worth reading.”

Facebook, Shutterfly, and Twitter are more examples of how a physician’s online office is gaining additional rooms and capabilities — and most importantly, engaging patients.

“We’re supposed to make a positive impact on patients’ lives in an eight-minute office visit,” says Livingston. “That’s a Herculean task. So we’re seeking ways online to extend that relationship beyond the exam room.”

Robert Lowes is an award-winning journalist based in St. Louis who has covered the healthcare industry for 21 years. He can be reached via physicianspractice@cmpmedica.com.

This article originally appeared in the November 2009 issue of Physicians Practice.