Personal Use

Using social media social media in your personal life can create work-related challenges.

Regardless of your privacy settings, your social media followers can take screenshots of your posts and share them. This can lead to unintended consequences. Something you post without much thought could affect your career.

Disclosing patient information on social media can violate federal laws and UVA Health policies.  

Keep these guidelines in mind:

• Remember that regardless of privacy settings, anything you post could be seen by your manager and colleagues.
• Never share a patient’s protected health information (PHI), including photos/videos and their name, hometown, or specific condition.
• If you take photos or videos at work, be mindful of accidental PHI disclosures: whiteboards, bulletin boards, or computer screens, or patients visible in the background.
• Get permission from co-workers before sharing images or info about them.
• Don’t friend/follow request patients or accept requests from them.

If you’re showing your own medical documents, like your COVID-19 vaccine card, cover private information like your birthdate or home address.

Many healthcare professionals use social media to network with colleagues, discuss healthcare issues, and/or speak directly to patients. These tactics can build your professional reputation. However, just like with a departmental account, you’ll need to consistently update your accounts and engage your followers to achieve success.

If you’d like to create an account, we ask that you understand and follow best practices. You can get started by:

1. Reading through the rest of these social media guidelines
2. Putting a disclaimer on your account with:

• A statement that all opinions are yours, not UVA’s
• A clinic phone number and/or link to UVA’s online appointment form

3. Meeting with Claude Moore Health Sciences Library’s online reputation management expert, Kimberley Barker