'social media' posts

For those of you who don't know, today is the official two year anniversary of the Swedish blog - this means Swedish has been blogging several times a week for two full years!

What have we been blogging about this year?

• Allergy prevention and management

• 10 things doctors and health care providers admire about patients

• The role of cancer rehabilitation

• For parents: dealing with picky eaters and healthy travel food tips, plus how to introduce solids to your infant (and other parenting topics)

• Marijuana smoking and the risk for lung cancer

• Recommended activity levels after different types of surgery

• The story behind 1-855-XCANCER and resources at the Swedish Cancer Institute

• Tips for those dealing with eczema and acne

• Deciding on surgical treatment for breast cancer and tips for accessing online information about breast cancer

• For moms and moms to be: nutrition in pregnancy and announcing the Lytle Center for Pregnancy and Newborns 

• Flu information

• Resources for those with hearing loss interested in cochlear implants from our live-tweeted and Instagrammed cochlear implant surgery

• Why you still need sunscreen in Seattle

• ...and many other topics

Who's been blogging?

We've had people from across Swedish blogging (more than 100 the last time we checked), including:

• Surgeons

• Nurses

• Family Medicine and Primary Care Physicians

• Dietitians

• Educators

• (And many others!)

Why are we blogging?

We started the blog as a way to connect with you (our community), whether you're a current patient, a past patient, a future patient…or just someone who stumbled across our site looking for health information. We believe our role is to be a resource of information, both online and off. Blogging gives us an easy way to keep you up to date, informed, and engaged on a number of health topics…

Kevin Brown


Marcel Loh

SEATTLE, April 1, 2013 – Swedish Health Services today announced that Chief Executive Kevin Brown is leaving Swedish to take a new position as CEO of Piedmont Healthcare in Atlanta.

SEATTLE, Oct. 9, 2012 - On Tuesday, Oct. 2, Eleanor Day, 79, underwent a cochlear implant procedure at Swedish/Cherry Hill by Dr. Douglas Backous, medical director of the Center for Hearing and Skull Base Surgery. Her procedure was the world’s first live-instagrammed and live-tweeted cochlear implant (hearing restoration) surgery (click here to see a recap). This Wednesday, Oct. 10, Swedish will live stream Mrs. Day’s cochlear implant activation, in which she will potentially hear her husband’s voice without the help of hearing aids for the first time in five years. The Days have been married for 60 years.

Dr. Greg Foltz, a brain surgeon from the Ivy Center for Advanced Brain Tumor Treatment at the Swedish Neuroscience Institute in Seattle is inviting 25 people (including students) to join him on Friday, Aug. 24 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. to become a “Brain Surgeon for a Day.” (Enter by 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, August 9, 2012.)

Randomly selected individuals will spend time learning about the brain and its key parts. These individuals will see how Swedish surgeons are using the latest research to find new treatments for brain cancer. As part of the event, these individuals will:

• Walk away with their own pair of Swedish medical “scrubs”, just like a doctor
• Participate in a behind the scenes tour and gain special access to places within the hospital most visitors do not get to see
• Rub elbows in the confides of the “green room” and meet some of the smartest physicians of the Pacific Northwest region
• Learn about brain tumors and why some are so deadly

At the conclusion of the tour, Dr. Foltz and other neuroscientists will host a lunch session with participants about his every day battle against brain cancer, a disease he hopes will be cured one day soon.

“Brain Surgeon for a Day” Schedule of Events:

• 11:00 AM: Scrub Up with your new pair of medical scrubs
• 11:05 AM: Meet and Greet with Dr. Greg Foltz of the Ivy Brain Tumor Center at Swedish
• 11:15 AM: Take part in an interactive session with brain tissue samples at the Seattle Science Foundation
• 11:50 AM: Guided behind-the-scenes tour of the Ivy Brain Tumor Center research lab, clinic and research partners
• 12:05 PM: Visit a behind-the-scenes location
• 12:20 PM: Lunch and Q&A session with Dr. Foltz and other special guests
• 1:00 PM Conclusion

Other possible events during the two-hour event:

• See the first commercial Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Core Facility in the U.S. and how it is being used for brain cancer.
• Explore the genome sequencing machines that help decode DNA in tumors.
• Meet ....

When you think of social media, what comes to mind? For many people, it might be keeping up with friends and family on Facebook or watching a viral video on YouTube. But have you ever thought of social media as a resource for your health?

For two years, Swedish has been exploring that very question. We’ve been testing the waters of social media to see how new modes of online communication can help us better serve our patients and the community.

So far, we like what we see and believe there’s great potential. Our physicians have used new tools, such as streaming video and online chats, to host virtual conversations about various health topics. We’re also learning that this is a whole new way to make our medical experts more accessible and approachable by creating forums where people can more easily tap into their knowledge and experience.

Can social media improve the health of the community? That's what many health-care organizations, including Swedish, are trying to find out. Recently, hospitals from across the country gathered in Seattle to discuss role of social media in health care.