Health Journalists on Twitter: Not Entirely Well, Thank You

I’m going to be hosting a webinar on how health journalists use social media soon.

So I thought I’d check out the health reporters on Muckrack.com, a website that aggregates Tweets of our nation’s journalistic corps.

It can be fascinating to see what sort of brain-lint the media produce minute-by-minute on the world’s tiniest news platform.

As I began writing this entry, for instance, there were dozens of Tweets not so much reporting, but wondering aloud what was up with, the “fact” that Gov. Sarah Palin seemed to be resigning, or at least not running for re-election, or something.

It was an enlightening moment in journalistic pop anthropology. You could see the complex thoughts of inside-the-Beltway sophisticates taking shape right before your  eyes.

Tweeted Howie Kurtz of the Washington Post: “Something must be up, I guess. Kind of weird.“

Talk about your first rough draft of history.

The Health Journalist Twitterers

But anyway, I was there to check out the Health niche. The health reporting corps has not for the most part discovered Muckrack yet: Only 10 health reporters’ Tweetstreams were aggregated on the Muckrack’s Health page.

They comprised three Baltimore Sun reporters, two from the Chicago Tribune, and one from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. [All Tribune Co. properties]. Then there is one each from CNBC, CBS News, the Montreal Gazette, and the New York Times.

And how were they using social media? The mixed bag you might expect.

Journalists on Twitter: Seeking Sources, Thinking Out Loud, Promoting Self, Getting Personal

Julie Deardorff of the Chicago Tribune, for instance, used Twitter to conduct some of source-fishing, cogitate about topics in her notebook, promote her own articles and, like all public-spirited Tweeters, reveal some personal information.

In Deardorff’s case, at least, the personal was professional.

• On Thursday June 25 she reported that she “injured my intercostal muscles by coughing for a week straight.”
• Two days later she reported she’d been diagnosed with pneumonia.
• And two days later she was back on the beat, trolling for sources to discuss the Nuval nutrition rating system.

Best-of-Class: Mike Huckman of CNBC

The most prolific health Twitterer on Muckrack–and, with over 3,000 followers, the most watched–is Mike Huckman, the pharma reporter for CNBC. Anybody interested in the bloodsport in the drug trade should follow Huckman’s sluice of reports, rulings, research and rumors about the companies that make America’s meds.

There is also insight into the life of a business journalist, such as this ripe observation about dealing with flacks. [Note the #prfail hashtag]:

mhuckman #prfail Just got call from PR person.I pick up phone,as always,”This is Mike.”They say,”Mike Huffman?”Pitching pvte co anyway,so 0 interest
a day ago by Mike Huckman, Pharmaceuticals Reporter, CNBC

Doctor!!!! Doctor!!!!!

CBS medical correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton Tweets about her comings and goings conducting interviews. Fairly routine stuff for journalistic Tweetle.

But for someone who is both a journalist and an M.D., she can be unusually enthusiastic. Within the stretch of 5 Tweets she managed to use 10 exclamation points. That may be a record of some sort.

New York Times and Twitter: Not a Healthy Situation

The smart set says that it’s poor form to use Twitter simply as a “push” device, as a tool to inflict yourself on the world. Everybody who participates in Twitter [it is said], even journalists, should expect to give more than they take, share tidbits with people who may appreciate them, develop relationships, etc. This is the spirit of the social web, it is said.

The biggest violator of this principle among the health reporting set on Muckrack is the estimable Tara Parker Pope, author of the New York Times’ Well health blog.

Her Tweetery consists almost entirely of two things: Links to her own blog entries and acolytic admirations of the fine work of her fellow Timesfolk. [i.e., "Interesting slide show on NyTimes Lens blog of homeless transgendered teens. http://bit.ly/14POwF"]

It’s true that Pope also gets personal; she Tweets about her preparation for the New York City Marathon.

taraparkerpope My 5.4 mi run tonight spent 630 calories according to http://www.gmap-pedometer.com . But now I’m 800 calories worth of hungry.
Tara Parker Pope, Well Columnist, New York Times

But that’s professional self-promotion too: Pope is the proprietor of RunWell, an online community for distance runners the Times launched recently.

Clearly Pope hasn’t gotten the Tweet about social media ethos. Another Twitter profile bears Pope’s name and likeness. nytimeswell is nothing but a botstream that’s triggered every time her blog updates.

Actually it’s triggered more often than that. Check out the series of simuTweets on celiac disease.

I found it peculiar that the New York Times was using Twitter is such a graceless manner compared to its peers.

The Times, after all, recently hired Jen Preston as its first Social Media Editor. Her task, presumably, would be to help staff make enlightened use of social web tools like Twitter.

So I clicked over to Preston’s feed in Muckrack to see how she is faring.

Not all that well, it turns out.

The Times’ social media doyenne hadn’t updated in about 3 weeks, and only three times since this one:

Working on response to 1,000 replies to last week’s question, how can @nytimes better use Twitter. MediaBistro conference later.
12:15 PM Jun 3rd from web