Using Twitter to increase content dissemination and control educational content with Presenter Initiated and Generated Live Educational Tweets (PIGLETs)

Abstract

Live-tweeting during educational presentations is typically learner-generated and can lead to misquoted information. Presenter curated tweets have not been well described. We created Presenter Initiated and Generated Live Educational Tweets (PIGLETs) with the goal to broaden the reach of educational conferences. We hypothesized that using PIGLETs would increase the reach and exposure of our material. We developed a prospective single-arm intervention study performed during the “Not Another Boring Lecture” workshops presented at two national conferences in 2015. Presenters tweeted PIGLETs linked to unique hashtags #NotAnotherBoringLecture and #InnovateMedEd. Analytic software was used to measure the following outcomes: (1) number of tweets published by presenters versus learners, (2) reach (users exposed to content containing the hashtag), and (3) exposure (total number of times content was delivered). One hundred and twenty-six participants attended the workshops. A total of 636 tweets (including retweets) were sent by presenters containing the study hashtags, compared with 162 sent by learners. #NotAnotherBoringLecture reached 47,200 users and generated 136,400 impressions; #InnovateMedEd reached 36,400 users and generated 79,100 impressions. PIGLETs allowed presenters to reach a significant number of learners, as well as control the content delivered through Twitter. PIGLETs can be used to augment educational sessions beyond the physical confines of the classroom.

Disclosure statement

The authors reports no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.

Glossary

Presenter Initiated and Generated Live Educational Tweets (PIGLETs): tweets created in advance by a presenter to highlight key academic points to augment a traditional lecture.

Reach: estimated total number of unique Twitter users to whom tweets containing the hashtag are delivered.

Exposure: estimated total number of times that tweets containing the hashtag are delivered to Twitter streams (also known as the potential number of impressions generated).

Notes on contributors

Sarah Tomlinson, MD, is a fellow in Pediatric Emergency Medicine at University of Michigan.

Mary Haas, MD, is a resident in Emergency Medicine at the University of Michigan.

L. Melissa Skaugset, MD, is in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Mary Bridge Children’s Hospital.

Stephen J. Cico, MD, MEd, is the Fellowship Director of Pediatric Emergency Medicine and an Associate Professor in the Departments of Emergency Medicine and Pediatrics at Indiana University.

Margaret Wolff, MD, is the Associate Program Director of the Pediatric Emergency Medicine fellowship, and an Associate Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at University of Michigan.

Sally Santen, MD, PhD, is the Assistant Dean of Educational Research and Quality Improvement, Associate Chair for Education, and Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Michigan.

Michelle Lin, MD, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at University of California, San Francisco.

Robert Huang, MD, is the Director of the Clinical Ultrasound Fellowship, Assistant Residency Program Director, and Instructor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Michigan.