Facebook Saves a Life

People all across the globe are reaching out to others seeking health advice and joining patient empowerment driven groups to better manage their care .

You may have read Helen Phung’s recent article mentioning a mother who was desperately racing against time to figure out what was wrong with her son. The remedy to the issue? Facebook.

Deborah Kogan, a mother of four, woke up on Mother’s Day to a playful four-year-old covered in a irritating rash. Like most mothers she assumed it was a common rash and that it would slowly dissipate, but it didn’t, in fact the rash turned into a fever. Thinking it was strep, she took him to the doctor. The 21st century mom used her phone to send a Facebook upload of her son on the exam table, looking lackadaisical yet still very much the playful little boy he always was.

Instantly her friends and Facebook followers started commenting on the photo asking what was wrong with her son. She responded that the doctor thought it was strep and was convinced he would be better in no time. The next morning she awoke to a even sicker little boy who once again was sitting on the exam table, this time for Scarlet fever. She snapped another photo of him with a caption of “baby getting sicker, eyes swollen shut, fever rising, penicillin not working. Might be scarlet fever or roseola or???…”

Kogan notes in her latest Slate feature on the social media miracle, that she thinks she was subconsciously trying to find an answer using Facebook and she got plenty of answers. Within a few hours, over 20 comments arrived, this time offering their take on his recent condition. One Facebook friend called imploring Krogan to go to the hospital immediately. Krogan’s friend said her son had the same symptoms before he was diagnosed with Kawasaki disease, a rare and often fatal auto-immune disorder that attacks the coronary arteries around the heart. The photo now had over 30 comments with three saying it looks like Kawasaki disease. With her so-called “spidey sense” she rushed to the hospital, called her family doctor and told him how she came to this conclusion through Facebook friends and he applauded the social media site. “I was actually just thinking it could be Kawasaki disease. Makes total sense. Bravo, Facebook,” said her family doctor.

For three weeks, Kogan’s son was treated and hospitalized for Kawasaki disease which then triggered liver disease from which he is still recuperating from. Here’s an excerpt from the Slate article in which Krogan relates what role Facebook played in her son’s treatment:

“Facebook transformed from my son’s inadvertent lifesaver to the most valuable tool in my arsenal: to keep family and friends abreast of his ever-mutating condition without having to steal time and emotional energy away from him; to pepper both the pediatrician, and Emily (Facebook friend), the pediatric cardiologist, with an endless series of random questions with which I was too embarrassed to bother my own doctors… To feel connected—profoundly connected—to the human race while living, breathing, eating and sleeping in the isolating, fluorescent-lit bubble of a children’s hospital ward, where any potential humans I might have “friended” on our floor were too distraught over the fates of their own children to make any room in their hearts for strangers.”

After reading this story I was blown away at the power social media. To be able to ease your health frustrations within minutes from people all over, many of whom you may not keep in constant contact with, is just incredible. Had she not reached out to the social world, her sons condition may have worsened and it could have been too late. We can utilize web-based products such as Facebook or even Practice Fusion’s online user forum, to connect with others in real-time, saving patients time and money.