An Analysis of WhatsApp Usage for Communication Between Consulting and Emergency Physicians

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate WhatsApp messenger usage for communication between consulting and emergency physicians. A retrospective, observational study was conducted in the emergency department (ED) of a tertiary care university hospital between January 2014 and June 2014. A total of 614 consultations requested by using the WhatsApp application were evaluated, and 519 eligible consultations were included in the study. The WhatsApp messages that were transferred to consultant physicians consisted of 510 (98.3%) photographic images, 517 (99.6%) text messages, 59 (11.3%) videos, and 10 (1.9%) voice messages. Consultation was most frequently requested from the orthopedics clinic (n = 160, 30.8%). The majority of requested consultations were terminated only by evaluation via WhatsApp messages. (n = 311, 59.9%). Most of the consulting physicians were outside of the hospital or were mobile at the time of the consultation (n = 292, 56.3%). The outside consultation request rate was significantly higher for night shifts than for day shifts (p = .004), and the majority of outside consultation request were concluded by only WhatsApp application (p < .001). WhatsApp is useful a communication tool between physicians, especially for ED consultants who are outside the hospital, because of the ability to transfer large amounts of clinical and radiological data during a short period of time.

Social media in knowledge translation and education for physicians and trainees: a&nbsp;scoping review

“…Finally, four studies (2.0%) measured organizational or patient outcomes. For example, one study compared the use of emergency department commu-nications and peer-to-peer learning via WhatsApp and standard telephone for educating peers during consultations [47].…”

WhatsApp Mobile Health Platform to Support Fracture Management by Non-Specialists in South Africa

“…Referral groups can be expanded to become formalized teaching platforms for continued learning and education based on the most common posted conditions, [25][26][27] thereby empowering and educating junior community doctors and non-specialists to manage appropriate conditions at lower levels of care. 28 One disadvantage of WhatsApp as a referral mHealth tool is the potential violation of patient confidentiality during group discussion. 25,29,30 To protect patient confidentiality, de-identified information was posted on ORG and the WhatsApp tail-response method (attaching a response directly to a query) was used to reference the appropriate case.…”

Social Media Messenger: Useful Tool for Decision Making in Obstetric Emergency Duty Hours.

“…To the best of our knowledge, there is no study in obstetrics till date where social media messenger has been used to speed up the diagnosis and tretment process.Gulacti U et al in 2014 used whatsapp in cases of myocardial infarction to speed up the procedure [3].…”