Google Hangouts on Air - a Game Changer for CME?

I recently had an opportunity to put together a CME course on Social Media and Web 2.0 in Medicine for the Cleveland Clinic CME department.

After the participants had learned about and had a chance to experiment with Twitter and Google+ hands on, we wanted to organize a panel discussion with several Social Media experts in the healthcare arena.  The budget for the CME course would not accommodate travel expenses to get panelists from out of town for a face-to-face discussion.  In addition it would be quite inconvenient to have people travel for a "one-hour" panel discussion.  These factors would limit who we could invite to the panel.

So in stead of compromising on our panelist selection, we decided to explore options for doing an online panel discussion.  Since the course was on the use of social media the natural choice was to do a Google Hangout and broadcast it live on YouTube (Google Hangout on Air).  What could be better than using the tools that you are learning about in the course!

The panelists were

Vineet Arora (@FutureDocs)

Katherine Chretien (@MotherinMed)

Anne Marie Cunningham (@AMCunningham)

Michelle Kraft (@Krafty)

This is the YouTube video of our Hangout on Air.  For a first time effort, it worked pretty smoothly. If you think you may want to do one of these yourself, read on.

The process of setting up the G+HOA the first time can be complex. So I am listing the steps here in case someone else wants to try this out.

• Make sure all the panelists are on Google+ and you have circled each other
• Make sure your YouTube account is linked to your Google account.
• Click Hangout from the menu on the left and click on Start Hangout on Air
• Give the Hangout a name and invite someone to it. This does not have to be the panelists or the audience.  I have a couple of different Google+ profiles and I just invite myself to it.
• Now start the Hangout
• Click on agree to any notifications that come up
• Invite your panelists
• This part is still not LIVE.  This is called the green room.
• You can talk to panelists, adjust lighting, microphones, go over the logistics etc.
• You can have everyone install the app Hangout tool box and enable the lower third (allows everyone to add their name and tagline or affiliation).  This will look mirrored but will appear correctly oriented for the audience.
• From the bottom right grab the YouTube link (this is the URL where the broadcast will appear live on YouTube).
• Share this URL with the audience - either on G+, in a private community or Twitter or FB.
• When they click on the link they will see a YouTube video with the message - "Starting soon".
• Now click on Start broadcast.  In about 10 seconds the broadcast will go live.  You can start your panel discussion as soon as it goes live.
• The moderator (the person who initiates the Hangout) can control which speaker shows up in the main window by clicking on their profile in the bottom of the hangout window
• The YouTube video shows up after a short delay (about 30 seconds) but then runs quite smoothly.
• Once the discussion is over, stop the broadcast
• You can debrief with the panelists and then end the broadcast.
• Afterwards you can edit the video adjust the title, description etc and then set the privacy settings in your YouTube video manager.

Several course participants were surprised learn about this functionality of Google+.  Several wanted to know how they could do this.  Our CME department wanted to discuss various uses for this technology - both for live courses and for creating enduring material.  

Consider the advantages of this technology for CME

1. Cost savings 
1. Travel costs
2. Free technology
2. Convenience
3. Ability to invite best panelists/speakers without above limitations
4. Feasible to for live audiences both face to face and remote
5. Since YouTube automatically archives the session, you can also embed the videos into online enduring materials.

Google+ Hangouts on Air might just be a game changer for CME.  What do you think?

Top Reasons to use Google Drive

Why do I use Google Drive?

1. Cloud storage with files available from anywhere, using any (web-enabled) device.  I have not had to use a flash drive (Thumb drive/USB drive in a long time).
2. Avoid sending large files by email - just share the file or send a link.
3. Ability to have offline files (when there is no Internet access) and still edit them - even on a tablet that does not have specific word processing software
4. Collaborative editing with any device - earlier today, my laptop battery drained and I used an iPad to co-edit a meeting notes.
5. Ability to share and edit files collaboratively synchronously during a hangout
6. The commenting feature is terrific - you can carry on a conversation around a document by responding to comments - if you @name someone it notifies them via email
7. The auto save and versioning means you never lose any data 
8. The spreadsheet allows for custom scripts which have been used for many purposes, my favorite is a auto-scoring online quiz.
9. The ability to create online forms and surveys that save the data to the spreadsheet.
10. You can publish documents to the web essentially creating web pages

AND its FREE!

3 Case Studies for managing information and staying organized

At a several recent meetings, colleagues have mentioned how they are finding it increasingly difficult managing information in various different settings.

Some examples:

1.  One colleague needs to have regularly scheduled meetings with a group of physicians.  They need to share and collaboratively author documents.  Not everyone can attend these meetings consistently.
2.  Another colleague finds it difficult to keep up with literature in his specialty.  He gets a lot of print journals, but does not have a streamlined way of recalling recent studies and finding them quickly when needed.
3.  A third colleague finds that she is getting disorganized, gets distracted and is unable to complete elective but high stake tasks.

Three very common problems and here are the solutions I proposed to them.  One criteria I used was to use  tools that were free.

1.  I suggested that he start using Google+ and Google Docs.  It is very surprising how many people do NOT know about these tools.  Sure there are other ways to do this but the sheer simplicity of Google Docs is a winner for any group with members that might be technically challenged.  The commonest question I get is, "How do I save the document?" Some other questions are, "How do I share this document?" or "Does it track versions?" 

I suggested he set up a Google circle with the participants.  He could then start a Google document and set it up to be editable by anyone with a link.  He could then copy the link and share it with the Google circle.  He could also start a Hangout at the next meeting to discuss the document and those who could not attend live, could participate via the Hangout.  Using Google Hangout with extras they could collaboratively edit the document.  

The part he loved was that at the end of the Hangout, the document was finalized and he did not have to send it to anyone.  They could all see it on Google Docs.  

2.  This conversation started when the colleague was complaining about the flood of lab results, copied charts, refill requests etc in his EHR inbox.  I mentioned a recent Archives article where they found that 50% of such messages and alerts are not important.  Even in the important messages 80% of the text is irrelevant to the critical message.  He was surprised I was able recall the article and pull it up quickly on my laptop.  

I described how I use Google Reader to subscribe to key journals in my area of interest.  In addition I have set up RSS feeds on specific key words from PubMed.  As I scan through the articles, I tag and organize them by specialty.  I share some of these articles with colleagues on Twitter or Google+ which leads to some interesting discussions and helps ingrain the article in my memory.  

The part that really works is finding the article that you have scanned/read/shared.  Google reader has an excellent search function and quickly pulls up any article in your set of journals whether you have read it or not.  

If you can spend some time each week scanning through your journals of interest on Google reader, you can generally recall studies that got published and can retrieve the article very quickly.

To get him started, I gave him a link to a bundle of medicine journals I follow.  He was able to get started with these with 1 click!

3.  The last case prompted me to suggest something that I have just started using.  One of my medical students recommended Workflowy to me.  This tool is another case of things being so simple that they just work.  Workflowy lets you create a bulleted hierarchical list.  The web page can be opened in any browser including on mobile devices.  You start off by creating a high level list like

• Personal
• Family
• Work

and then create sub-items.  You can add notes to the items and strike through items that you have completed.  I am planning a trip to Peru and the amount of stuff that needed to be done e.g. flights, train tickets, forms for the consulate, Machu Picchu entrance tickets, hotels, SIM card etc. all needed to be completed.  Putting it together in one list and then adding notes of web sites, phone numbers, confirmation numbers etc made the whole process very organized.  I was able to share the list with my wife who could also complete and cross off certain items.  Being able to spend a few minutes to complete elective tasks takes a huge burden off ones shoulders and is very stress relieving.  If still need more help, you can use the Pomodoro extension on your browser (Chrome) to block off all distractions for a specified amount of time till you complete the task.

I will be first to admit that I am not the most organized of people and am constantly trying to find solutions for this.  Still these are tools I use regularly (except the Pomodoro) and they help immensely.  

The Indisputable Benefit of Social Media and Web 2.0

Earlier today, we submitted a proposal to do a workshop for medical educators on learning how to use Social Media tools.  Who is "We" you ask?
Therein lies the story.

Anne Marie Cunningham (@ancunningham) in Cardiff, Wales, UK
Natalie Lafferty (@nlafferty) at Dundee, Scotland, UK and
I (@Neil_Mehta) at Cleveland, OH, USA

As you can imagine planning the content and flow of a highly interactive and hands on activity needs excellent collaboration, best done face to face.  But we were separated by time and distance.

We planned the entire workshop using Google tools.  There are some really useful features (some recently added) that make it easy and efficient to collaborate.  I am going to highlight a few.

1. Google Docs: We all know how you can create and share a Google document with multiple people.  The comment feature is particularly useful.  Much like MS Word, you can highlight a sentence and insert a comment.  But in Google Docs, if someone else comments on your comment, you automatically get an email with the new comment and a link back to the document.
2. Google+ allows you to have a rich discussion on a topic and keep it private - between the collaborators.  You get e-mails when someone adds to the discussion and also get notification on the Google bar.
3. Google Hangout provides a free method for multi-user video conferencing.  The quality is excellent as long as all parties have good broadband connections.  If necessary, one can "mute" the video to improve audio quality.
4. Google Hangout recently added extra features which allow you to share your screen or even share and edit a Google Document collaboratively.  
5. You can also take notes during the Hangout.  The notes are automatically saved in Google Docs and are available after the Hangout session.  Participants who clicked on and viewed the notes during the Hangout can see these in their Google documents.
6. Scheduling a Hangout can be a problem as right now Google+ is not directly linked to Google Calendar.  But you can create Available appointment slots on your Google calendar and ask people to reserve these.  After trying this once, we switched to Doodle.

Overall I think all 3 of us learned a lot about these features and I for one would recommend these without hesitation for anyone collaborating over a different time zones or even across the campus!

There is a lot of buzz about using Social Media in (medical) education.  There are a lot of people reluctant to jump into the fray, often for valid reasons.  This story is a very good example of one indisputable advantage of Social Media and Web 2.0.  I have never met Anne Marie Cunningham or Natalie Lafferty face to face.  Still we got to "know" each other via Social Media (mostly via Twitter and reading each other's blogs) and found that we share a lot of common interests around medical education and were able to collaborate on a workshop at an international meeting.  

Social media helps us connect with people who one would never otherwise meet, and helps overcome logistic barriers to collaborate with them.  It helps broaden our horizons and in a true social constructivist sense, it  helps us learn.

Educational Applications of Google+ Hangout

Google+ has taken off like a rocket growing to an estimated 4.5 million users in 1 week.  One of the "wow" features of G+ is Hangout.

Hangout allows you to create a multi-user video chat with up to 10 participants.  You see feeds from all 10 webcams at the bottom of the screen.  When person speaks, the software automatically presents the speakers webcam feed in the main window.  The quality is remarkably good depending mainly on the connection speed of individual users.

An additional neat feature is a G+ user can start a Hangout session that is visible only to a specified group of contacts.  There is also the ability to carry out a concurrent text chat session.

So how can we use this educationally?  Here are some examples:

• Pose a question to a Twitter chat audience e.g. #meded and allow groups of participants to discuss the question in a Hangout Session and then report back to the Twitter stream.
• Upload a YouTube video of a hypothetical case - use an animation tool to simulate a doctor patient encounter.  Launch this video during a Hangout session so all participants can watch it together, and follow this up with a moderated discussion.
  
• Invite thought leaders to discuss a controversial topic on a Hangout session.  Record the session using something like CamStudio.  Then upload the entire recording to YouTube to share with viewers.  Can use this YouTube vodcast as focus of a future Hangout session.
  

So what do you think?  The technology bar has really been lowered.  You can with this free tools bridge geographic and logistic divides to have a real conversation!