Social Media Trends for Anesthesiologists in 2024

It seems like just as you get comfortable with one platform, everyone has moved on to another. For many years, Twitter (now “X”) has been a top pick for medical professionals because we could join the chatter on the latest trending studies, share links to our publications, and interact with the experts in our field. Since new leadership took over in November 2022, X’s United States user base has been down 23% (asamonitor.pub/44oGQto). X has restricted searching for nonusers and limited third-party tools, which has made it more challenging for physicians to connect (asamonitor.pub/4dprFEo). While the X physician community remains strong, many have increased their presence on LinkedIn and Mastodon, which also support link sharing, connections with experts, and professionally focused content. Threads, a new text-based app fueled by Meta (which owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp), may have the potential to out-compete many of these current giants. Physicians are also making use of online forums, such as ASA Community, Doximity, Reddit, and Facebook groups, for crowdsourcing ideas for complex practice issues. Apps based in visual media, such as Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, continue to rise and are preferred by younger generations.

You may have noticed that the first results to pop up in your internet searches have been videos rather than links. Social media platforms and even search engines like Google (which owns YouTube) now push video content regularly (asamonitor.pub/3JJ0RkR). For example, a Google search of “cosmetic enhancements anesthesia” will yield three videos from the Anesthesia Patient Safety Foundation (APSF) before listing the actual APSF Newsletter article (asamonitor.pub/3xVAWUq).

Video is quickly becoming the leading format among the fastest growing social media platforms. Web-based search engines are now in competition with social media platforms as the primary tool used for searches, with 40% of Generation Z using TikTok and Instagram instead of Google (asamonitor.pub/3Wo6koR). For anesthesiologists, it is increasingly important to put video and social media content behind important anesthesia initiatives to help increase visibility and enhance engagement with key audiences. Anesthesiologists like Drs. Max Feinstein, Robert Singleton III, Shonna Hargrove, and John Patton III are leading the way, using their creativity and medical knowledge to educate the public and guide hopeful students toward a career in medicine and anesthesiology.

It’s no surprise to anyone that a major incentive for social media companies is to keep users on their platforms as long as possible. Social media influencer Gary “Vee” Vaynerchuk quips, “I’m day trading attention.” With social media companies vying for a finite amount of attention among ever-increasing internet chatter, new tactics, many rooted in artificial intelligence (AI), have been developed to do just that, in spite of increasing public scrutiny and regulation. Some tactics include (Int J Environ Res Public Health 2019;16:2612):

1. Endless scrolling. Your news feed never runs out of content.
2. Peer pressure. Your friends can see if you’ve read their posts or are starting a reply (“…”), and you feel obligated to respond.
3. Sunk costs. You may not have spent a dime on social media, but you have put in a lot of effort cultivating your community. You want to make it worth it, so you keep refreshing.
4. Content discovery. Your news feed doesn’t just show you content from those you follow – it also presents ads and adjacent content (“You might also like…”), prompting you stick around to follow the platform’s suggestion.
5. Profiling and visibility moderation. While profiling is associated with law enforcement, it’s done by social media companies as well, often with AI. The inferences made about your characteristics, preferences, and future actions or inactions are unknown to you as a user, yet they can lead to influences in real life, such as in job screening and credit scoring (Information, Communication & Society 2021;26:809-25). Algorithms tend to promote PRIME information (prestigious, ingroup, moral and emotional) for engagement, and this may be at the expense of non-PRIME posts (Trends in Cognitive Sciences 2023;27:947-60). TikTok, allegedly to prevent bullying, was found to suppress videos of users who were “unattractive” or who had developmental disorders (Policy & Internet 2022;14:79-95).

As a consumer

1. It’s not just the algorithm, it’s you, too. Your feed is designed to give you more of the content you interact with the most. If you recently got into a comment war over your least favorite political candidate, don’t be surprised if your feed starts bringing you more of the same. If you find your feed stuffed with PRIME content, choose to intentionally interact with posts from people of different backgrounds. Why not influence the algorithm back?
2. Don’t let the apps decide when you open them. While everyone loves the thrill of a new notification, the constant nudge to check an app will start to interfere with real life. Put all of your social media apps into one folder on your phone and check it during set periods of your choosing. You could even remove apps from your phone completely.
3. Have an intention for each platform. It can be overwhelming and redundant to use every platform to meet all of your needs and interests. You can curate your professional profile on X and LinkedIn, and you can use media-heavy platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok to deep dive into anesthesia-adjacent topics or hear from patients themselves about their experiences.
4. Online is not your only community. Those in my generation remember when social media was new. Finally, we discovered other people out there just like us. Growing up, I didn’t know a single woman with a doctoral degree. If it wasn’t for the connections I made on social media and message boards, I would never have become a physician. Social media remains vital for connecting the parts of us that don’t quite fit in elsewhere, but it doesn’t take the place of the real communities in which we physically exist. With less “third spaces” for adults and children to spend time, it becomes even more important to deliberately foster positive relationships with the neighbors, colleagues, relatives, and friends we see every day… even the ones we seem to have nothing in common with.

As a creator

1. Social media is social! You have so much to tell the world that it’s easy to get lost in content creation, sharing, and metrics. The real beauty of social media is the connection. There may be hundreds of creators saying the same thing, but there’s only one ∗you.∗ Users value authenticity and will follow you for your personality, style, and substance. Engage with each comment, follow your followers back, and create a community around your mission. Drs. Sasha Shillcutt, Ed Mariano, and Alopi Patel are great examples.
2. Pause before you open the analytics page. It’s OK not to go viral. It’s OK not to have the biggest account in anesthesiology. In fact, a larger account might harm your mission. Our field is niche and remains mystifying even to our physician colleagues. If your passion is isoflurane spills or how to find free MOCA patient safety credits, you aren’t going to have the same worldwide audience as a doctor who does reaction videos to pimple popping. First think of what metrics are meaningful to you. A post that generates an engaging discussion among your followers may be more valuable than how many impressions it gets. Airway enthusiasts Drs. Laura Duggan and James DuCanto come to mind as high-quality niche creators who benefit their followers with education and discussion.
3. Social media will always be there (in some form). If you’re reading this, you probably already have a day job. An important, cool, and highly demanding day job. While the advice to post daily on multiple platforms in multiple forms of media is not necessarily bad, this isn’t practical for a busy anesthesiologist. It’s OK to grow your following slowly, and if life gets in the way, take a step back for a while. You can even schedule your social media engagement around your own yearly rhythms. One of my favorite examples of this is Dr. Jeff Gadsden’s Blocktober (asamonitor.pub/4b0d6FF). Every October 1-31, he shares daily posts on different regional anesthesia techniques, and it’s something many of us have begun to look forward to each year.