Hi nurse bloggers or future nurse bloggers,
You’re probably coming across this page because you’re interested in blogging, or writing your experiences, as a nurse.
Blogging is a great way to:
- Reflect on the day you had and how you can do better
- Share your experiences with other nurses
Personally, I feel compelled to write about my experience because I get really drawn into other people’s blogs when they describe their story and figured others feel the same way. However, many times people remain anonymous about themselves, the school they’ve gone to, and their workplace. They often do things for a few reasons:
- Fear of attention
- Fear of consequences
- Horror stories of nurses getting fired for breach in privacy and confidentiality
Of course, I don’t want repercussions for displaying the wrong information. Before I started writing, I did some searches on social media guidelines, but a lot of them are not specific. To shorten the mumble jumble, I’ve consolidated the pages of guidelines to 3 things.
- Comply with HIPPA. Don’t use any identifiable information such as a name, specific age, race, specific health condition, specific surgery, address, room number, family members, specific doctors, etc. One way to overcome this barrier is to switch names or if you’ve had similar patients, merge experiences you’ve had together.
- No pictures with patients or the hospital without written consent. Don’t take any pictures and don’t post them anywhere unless you have received permission. Even if you have received permission, it is best to show something in the positive light.
- Be positive. Writing negative things about specific people such as patients and coworkers is really easy to do (it’s hard not to complain). However, whatever you write will stay on the internet forever, even if you delete the information later on. It is better to deal with negative things with people one on one. While it is true that things don’t change unless you bring up what is ‘bad’ or ‘wrong’, it does not mean complaining about it on the net is any better.
So what are topics that you can discuss?
- One way to discuss something negative though is to discuss an issue or a problem, and suggest ways to abolish the problem or improve a system. There are many issues that need solutions. That is how we improve healthcare!
- Your conversations with patients and family, and the healthcare team.
- What you learned from a situation.
- Connecting what you see in the field, what you read in textbooks and journals, and what theories apply.
If you would like more details, I recommend reading the Online Journal of Nursing and the National Council of State Board of Nursing for Social Media Guidelines.