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FAQs about new social media site for doctors and consumers

Posted by med3q in Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX on Jul 09, 2007

FAQs

Q: Who is behind the concept of med3q?

A: Investor and healthcare executive W. Harwood (“Woody) Runner began developing the concept for med3q after he was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 2006 and couldn’t locate the tools he felt he needed to manage his disease and maintain his health. Further into this thinking, Runner decided the website should be useful not only to people with multiple chronic conditions but to their doctors as well.

Runner’s background includes experience as a successful healthcare executive and investor in a variety of businesses, including healthcare.

As a successful investor and executive, Runner recognizes the enormous market potential of a social networking website dedicated to healthcare that embraces both the public and credentialed healthcare professionals and motivates them to be involved on med3q every day.

To build a Web platform strong enough to sustain a large and active online community, Runner teamed with Intellimar Solutions, a leading developer and provider of the technology that enables interactive, Web-based social networking sites.

Q: What is the market potential of med3q?

A: There are more than 650,000 doctors in the United States alone. Other doctor-oriented sites have captured about 10,000 physicians – a small fraction of the potential. We believe a great opportunity exists by bringing together doctors and the people with chronic diseases they serve. It is premature to talk about market potential, but med3q plans to be in the top 100,000 websites within six months.

Q. Are there any doctors involved with the development of med3q?

A. med3q’s management team gets significant input from an advisory board that comprises experienced business and medical professionals from the healthcare, technology and investment fields. These advisors include:

Dr. Donald S. Bialek, M.D., MPH, senior industry advisor, Computer Sciences Corporation, New York

Nancy J. Bristow, R.N., B.S.N., C.D.E., consultant, Diabetes and Endocrine Associates of Tarrant County, Fort Worth, Texas

Dr. Gregory L. Cooper, D.P.M., chief medical officer, Mercy Medical Group, Sacramento, Calif.

Dr. Ralph A. Gambardella, M.D., chairman, Kerlan-Jobe Orthopedic Clinic, Los Angeles

Dr. Darren Lackan, M.D., president, Diabetes and Thyroid Center of Fort Worth, Texas

Jim Pennington, president and CEO, ppoNEXT, Inc., Westlake, Texas

David Ritter, database developer, ShopLocal, LLC, Chicago

Richard Scruggs, Winston Sage Partners, Houston, director of the Center for New Ventures and Entrepreneurship, Mays Business School - Texas A&M University

Q. How can doctors use med3q?

A. med3q provides significant value to credentialed physicians by offering them entirely free, doctors-only Web-enabled social networking, peer-to-peer support, and expert guidance on career development, practice management, patient relations, personal finance, and more. Their patients who join as members can share health reports with the doctor, from data gathered and stored on med3q.

Q. What can community members accomplish with med3q?

A. med3q is the first free Web-enabled community to bring together the tools, support and interaction members need to manage their medical conditions effectively in a secure environment. These include:

specific medical information

lifestyle management tools

physician communications channels

peer-to-peer interaction

special interest groups

wide range of topical forums

med3q members can create and use free online diaries and medical information reports that securely track and report vital health and lifestyle information to their physicians (if they are also med3q members) on a permission-only basis.

In addition, members can gather health and lifestyle data from member blogs, forums and selected healthcare news.

Q. What is BizRx^™?

A. BizRx is unique to med3q. It is a free service for physicians that addresses common points of pain faced by busy doctors in the areas of business, practice management, patient relations, personal finance and more.

Engaging and stimulating stories from industry experts in audio and written format are provided at med3q in 5-to7-minute installments. Bite-size and relevant, BizRx helps time-crunched physicians think through important, but too-often neglected, aspects of their professional lives affecting the day-to-day management of their practice, revenue and profitability, wealth building, patient satisfaction, risk and more.

Credentialed med3q physician members have access to fascinating interviews with successful business experts, presentations and other educational tools on the med3q site developed just for them. In addition, they can interact directly with these subject matter experts through med3q.

Q. How much does med3q cost users?

A. Nothing. The website and its features are available to members at absolutely no cost.

Q. Then how does med3q make money?

A. med3q makes money by offering sponsorships and other fee-based opportunities to the broad range of businesses and service providers that want to speak directly to credentialed physicians, other credentialed healthcare professionals, and the community of consumers who are dedicated to managing chronic medical conditions and maintaining a healthy way of living. Potential sponsors could be pharmaceutical and medical device companies, accountants and attorneys who specialize in physician practices, consumer goods manufacturers, or makers of sports apparel or nutritional products to name a few.

Q. How is med3q different from other sites like Sermo, WebMD or RevolutionHealth?

A. For starters, med3q differs from all other healthcare websites because it brings both the medical professional and the healthcare consumer together and gives each group its own secure platform to allow each member to engage in online social networking and to exchange information with the other group as they choose.

For credentialed healthcare professionals, med3q is a one-of-a-kind online stop for professional exchanges that affect clinical and practice management issues while fostering social networking among peers. med3q’s twin goals are to help community members stay on top of their health and to improve the work and personal lives of physicians, physician assistants, nurses and other credentialed medical professionals.

Unlike other consumer-oriented healthcare sites, med3q provides totally free interactive tools, such as diaries and calculators, for managing multiple chronic conditions on a real-time basis. Members have the ability to share personal health-related data they record with physicians (who are also site members) on a secure, permission-only basis.

For more details, two charts are available. One chart compares med3q with physician-only professional websites and the other compares med3q with consumer-oriented healthcare websites.

Q: How does med3q fit into the consumer-driven healthcare movement?

A: We live with a healthcare system that tells us one thing and does another. As consumers, we increasingly hear that we are supposed to take charge of our healthcare. Yet, the system that delivers that care is overseen and operated by government, insurance and provider organizations that regularly restrict our choices and stymie our ability to take charge. med3q gives consumers and their immediate caregiver physicians the resources and tools that they need to help move toward a patient-centric relationship that is a necessary first step if we, as consumers, are really going to take charge. As such, med3q expands the concept of consumer-driven healthcare beyond its origins in employer-sponsored healthcare packages. The site gives members the tools and support to manage their health and well-being instead of just overseeing their healthcare benefits. Thus, the website is equally valuable to those who have comprehensive employer health insurance, those who provide their own insurance, and those who are under-insured or uninsured.

Q: Does med3q plan to go international?

A: Yes, although the timetable for expansion is not yet established.

Q: Will med3q be available in other languages?

A: Yes. It will be helpful to anyone with online access — even people in countries with single-payer systems like Canada and the United Kingdom. These people can still benefit from free tools to manage their lifestyle and health.

Q: What is a social network and how is that related to social media?

A: The traditional description of a social network is individuals or organizations linked by one or more specific type of relationships, such as kinship, friends, likes, dislikes, financial exchange, hobbies, professional referrals — the range of ties is very wide. With the exception of pen pals or phone contacts, traditional social networks customarily depend primarily on in-person interactions among individuals or organizations.

The advent of Internet and World Wide Web technologies that underpin emerging social media, often called Web 2.0, makes it possible for social networks to exist without any, or minimal face-to-face contact. Instead of networking at an in-person meeting with someone across town, it’s now possible to network with unseen and unmet individuals in other parts of the country or the world.

Specific examples of Web-enabled social media include MySpace.com, YouTube.com, and, now, med3q.com. Each of these sites brings together people who may never have met or even seen each other, but who are linked by a common interest. In the case of med3q, that interest is improved health and well-being.

Technology-enabled social media can take many forms, including blogs, forums and groups among others. The methods of information exchange and communication among and within social media include audio, images, text and video.

Q: What are a blog and the blogosphere?

A: A blog is shorthand for Web log. A blogger is someone who posts a combination of audio, text and video to a website for others to consume. Blog topics are limited only by the blogger’s imagination. The blogosphere is the entire virtual world of blogs.

Q: What is a kblog?

A: That is shorthand for a knowledge blog. A kblogger has specific expertise or specialized information to share with others via a kblog. This type of blog most often is not available to the public but serves as a private knowledge management system. Many of the physician members of med3q can be said to be kblogging when they share their medical knowledge or expertise with their professional peers or with the public.

Q: What is a forum or message board?

A: Web-based forums are usually dedicated to a specific topic and allow forum members to post their opinions on that subject. While message boards may be open to anyone, forums generally are monitored to keep postings on topic and free from insults or profanity.