I managed to tweet my way into becoming an industry expert in 140 characters or less. After two decades of shooting in medical settings, I can comfortably proclaim to be a healthcare photography expert. But I feel more like a social media student than an expert. In fact it was a homework assignment that sparked my idea for the iPhone app that landed me in the MedAdNews article by Fabio Gratton and Michael Spitz.

Top 10 healthcare social media predictions for 2010 – more than 30 industry experts tweet their perspectives

I first became involved in social media through blogging and explored Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn as ways to share the posts and to learn what was going on the space. The more I explored, the more I saw the early hype about the paradigm shift in communications becoming reality in the new space. I was being drawn into my Twitter stream, both as a way of learning about the new field and because the links, and conversations were so fascinating.

Social media is about making connections. This story started with the real life meeting of Charlie Kimball. He’s an Indy Lights race car driver with Type 1 diabetes that’s a patient of my wife. He tweets under his name @charliekimball and his NovoNordisk sponsor moniker @raceswithinsulin. I follow both versions of Charlie and most of the time he simply shares about going to the track or his exercise routine between races. But back in June of 2009, he made history with “the first branded Pharma tweet”. At first glance it was a routine post about Charlie giving himself an insulin shot, but to those in pharmaceutical advertising it was a watershed.

One of those people is the MedAdNews co-writer, Fabio Gratton @skypen. He’s a close follower of the issues surrounding Charlie’s Tweet who’s been a leader the healthcare ad community working to obtain clarification from the Federal Drug Administration about what can be said by Pharma companies in the social media space. Fabio and I have now met in person and I answered his Twitter question asking for a social media healthcare prediction.

The TCOYD iPhone app prototype

The iPhone app idea came from my recent work with the diabetes education group Taking Control of Your Diabetes. I’m helping to guide their entry into the social media space. We want to build an awareness for their events, keep the participants connected and ideally, healthier by providing continuing diabetes education. Their Twitter stream is now active @TCOYD , their Facebook community is growing, and more projects are in the pipeline. Working with them is extremely rewarding. It allows me to expand beyond my normal photography role and use my diabetes knowledge combined with my experience in healthcare marketing and social media.

My final project in my New Media Marketing class at UCLA Extension will be to describe what the app might do. It’s more of a thought experiment now with good artwork (thanks to help from PhotoShopDude, Micheal Standlee) where the intent is to pull together all of the social media streams we create at TCOYD into one place on the iPhone, and soon – the iPad. Once their streams are in place we will look into building the app.

The app could initially work like the New York Times app that breaks out the news into the section headings of politics, sports, business, and more. Further developments could turn it into a diabetes management tool and there could even be a way to use the app interactively at the live events.

Any suggestions on how it might be programed? Who do you know that could make the app? Can I build it myself with a little help?

Mark Harmel

harmelphoto.com

@MarkHarmel

Update: AFS Racing/Andretti Autosport Signs Charlie Kimball to 2010 Firestone Indy Lights Lineup. This was the strongest team in the series in 2009 and should lead to a good 2010 for Charlie.

Parade Magazine talks about Charlie Kimball racing with diabetes and our shared “Charlie’s Angels”.

I’m excited to have my own driver racing at Indianapolis this weekend. Now Charlie Kimball wasn’t always my driver. He was a recent discovery – or more precisely he discovered my wife to become his diabetes doctor. The Camarillo resident was over in Europe racing in the Formula 3 Euro Series when he was hospitalized after becoming ill in England. He had developed Type 1 diabetes and consulted with my wife, Dr. Anne Peters. She has worked with other top athletes with diabetes including Olympic swimmer Gary Hall, Jr.

Intense focus before his qualifying run at the Long Beach Grand Prix

She worked with him first on managing his diabetes to stay healthy and then progressed to helping him manage his blood sugar while driving. In addition to gauges that monitor his car’s performance you can see his continuous glucose monitor mounted on his steering wheel. The condition that once threatened to end his racing career has now helped him to land major sponsors as he returns to racing in the Indy Lights Series. He even has a new green Levemir paint scheme on his #35 car.

In the middle of his steering wheel is a Dexcom Continuous Glucose Monitor

The second race of their season was on the streets of Long Beach and I was able to tag-a-long with his “race doctor” and visit with him back in the racing trailer and be in the pits as he prepared for his qualifying runs and the race. Sitting with his friends and family in the stands it was thrilling to watch him come down the long straightaway and picking off car after car in the 1st turn passing zone. It was very different than my normal NASCAR fan behavior of rooting for a good race, unlike the die-hard fans of Jr. Nation that cheer for Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Getting ready for the race

This Friday (May 22nd) Charlie will race at Indianapolis –  the most important track in America. As he quotes in his blog, “I have been to ‘big’ races all over the world- Monaco Grand Prix, Macau Grand Prix, Long Beach Grand Prix, a Moto GP race. I have even been to qualifying at the 500 before, but being a part of the whole ‘Month of May’ is a totally different experience.”

To learn more about Charlie you can read his blog and follow him on Twitter.

Charlie also has been the talk of the healthcare blog and Twittersphere after he sent out the first branded tweet under his @racewithinsulin moniker. There was a bit of an uproar at first that has died down to an official review of FDA guidelines on how pharmaceutical companies and medical device manufacturers can use social media.

Mark Harmel

harmelphoto.com

@MarkHarmel