A new policy adopted this week by the AMA House of Delegates meeting in San Diego aims to help physicians maintain a positive online presence and preserve the patient-physician relationship when email and other social media are used.

“The new policy outlines a number of considerations physicians should weigh when building or maintaining a presence online,” said AMA Board Member Mary Anne McCaffree, MD.

The new policy encourages physicians to:

• Use privacy settings to safeguard personal information and content to the fullest extent possible on social networking sites.
•  Routinely monitor your own Internet presence to ensure that the personal and professional information on the physician’s own website and content posted about them by others is accurate and appropriate.
•  Maintain appropriate boundaries of the patient-physician relationship when interacting with patients online and ensure patient privacy and confidentiality is maintained.
•  Consider separating personal and professional content online.
•  Recognize that actions online and content posted can negatively affect a physician’s reputation among patients and colleagues, and may even have consequences for their medical careers.

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