GEP Medicine in Society Guide 2024/25

4.3. Social Media

Whilst there are opportunities to engage, collaborate, and learn through social media, there are also a range of risks. An important risk is the blurring of social and professional boundaries through the use of social media.

We expect you to follow the guidance of GMC’s Using social media as a medical professional (2024) and Queen Mary University London’s Guidance for staff on the use of social media (2020), please familiarise yourself with these documents.

Please see the extract below from the GMC guidance

“The term ‘social media’ includes the use of private messaging, websites and applications that enable users to create and share content, or to participate in social networking. 

Using social media creates risks where social and professional boundaries become unclear. You must follow the guidance in Maintaining personal and professional boundaries.

The standards expected of you as a medical professional do not change because you are communicating through social media, rather than face to face or through other methods of communication. However social media is constantly evolving, as are societal norms and expectations. 

Appropriate personal and professional boundaries are essential between medical professionals and their patients, and between medical professionals and their colleagues.

….When communicating privately, including using instant messaging services, you should bear in mind that messages or other communications in private groups may become public.”