Nursing Program Social Media Policy

(Adopted August 2012)

The information on this page is for students who have been accepted to the TMCC Nursing Program and are current students.

Purpose

Person in scrubs using phone

The purpose of this policy is to define and describe acceptable use of social media within the Maxine S. Jacobs Nursing Program.

Social media may be defined and described as sharing information through social networks and the Internet for rapid knowledge exchange and dissemination among many people. Nursing students, and nursing faculty (referred to collectively as "nurses") have a professional obligation to understand the nature, benefits and consequences of participating in social networking of all types.

Nurses must be aware that social networking venues are shared by their patients and colleagues. Unintended consequences of social media use can breach a patient's privacy, damage a patient's trust in the individual nurse and the profession, and further damage a nurse's professional and personal future. Employers and educational institutions may also monitor social networking sites and make judgments, positive or negative, about a nurse's professional suitability. Sharing patient information, even with names removed, may be enough to trigger a HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) violation and its associated policies.

Definition of Terms

  1. Content: Including but not limited to: text, files, profiles, concepts, opinions, images, photos, videos, sounds or other materials that are transmitted, communicated, shared, submitted, displayed, published, broadcast or posted.
  2. Social Media: Internet-based or electronic applications and personal websites that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content such as but not limited to: profiles, opinions, insights, pictures, videos, experiences, perspectives and media itself.
  3. Social Media Communications: Any medium used in content and communication exchange including but not limited to: blogs, photo sharing, online comments and posts, instant messages, videos, podcasts, microblogs, social networks, online communities and wikis. Examples of social media applications include but are not limited to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Craig's List, YouTube, LinkedIn, BlogSpot, Second Life, Upcoming, Flickr and Wikipedia.