Instagram has become an extremely powerful tool that can cater to nearly any audience. You enjoy baking? Share your recipes and delegacies. You like make up? Share tutorials. Are you traveling the world? Share your monumental flicks. Are you an inspiration in the field of medicine? Share your journey and life. Wait, what? The last thing many of us may associate together are social media and medicine. What? Who? How? Instagram seems to only have to do with pop culture and the youth. But more and more often, we are seeing qualified physicians share their work, journey, advice and day to day ventures through their camera lens. It’s the coolest thing ever. Instagram is the ultimate platform for physicians of every type as they are able to share both their voices and opinions, procedures done in the office and advice for current premedical/medical students, and to people who may be misinformed about the field. All while consequently making more money through a constant stream advertisements. Rather than keeping their lives as doctors behind the screens, these stories are being shared. More and more students are becoming inspired to take it on. You get to see the journey and you’ll see what it takes. You can see where it takes you. And then you may ask yourself if you want it. It is one of the most incredible forms of career inspriation, and doctors are taking it by storm.
A few of my favorite accounts are: @Doctor.Mike, @DrSheilaNazarian and @BeautyByDrCat. All of these doctos share every aspect of their lives as physicians — their daily activities, the procedures they complete and also advice, both specific and generalized. I am able to scroll through Instagram and learn something new every single day. Whether it be the most recent innovation in acne treatments or the amazing results of a seemingly impossible revision surgery, I am constantly stunned.
These Instagram doctors are able to connect with both their patients and an audience of those interested in the field on a more personal level. And they share more knowledge than they ever could before. In life, all people see is the end result. We are not predisposed to the long nights, moments of rejection and continuous feelings of doubtfulness. We do not see what that person went through to get where they are now. We don’t know how much effort it took to make six figures. We don’t see it. We don’t know how to make the journey smoother or approach it differently, because we don’t know how the journey went. Instagram allows us to be more informed, if used appropriately. Doctors are sharing their pasts, the moments of trouble but also the highlights that followed, all to help us understand why it was worth it, and why it is worth it for more and more students to tackle. We are able to understand the full picture and visualize it for ourselves. Here are some inspiring posts featuring another of my favorites, Dr. Dagny Zhu:
This applies not only to the field of medicine— have a story? Endured a journey? Have something to say? Share it! Share what you’ve been through, share what you are doing now and serve as a source of inspiration for those around the world! Instagram is a tool for global impact. Social media can be utterly dangerous and damaging, but also absolutely incredible if used the right way. If it’s used to connect as it was intended to, it can truly do amazing things and it is time we take advantage of that.