patient friend request on Facebook

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I am wondering what anyone thinks about nurses adding patients as friends on Facebook? Many of the people on my friends list on Facebook are nurses I work with. We have a patient who get's admitted into the hospital frequently and is always on my floor. We have all taken care of her at some time or another so I'm sure she feels very familiar with us. Just recently one of the nurses accepted a friend request from this patient. I had to change all my privacy settings on facebook because I didn't feel it was appropiate for this patient to be able to see what goes on in my personal life. (not that there is anything going on in my personal life but it's just the point) Now there are 3 nurses who have added this patient to their friends list. If any of you know how facebook works depending on your privacy settings you can see your friends list of friends which means this patient can see all the other nurses, family members ,ect (even my nurse manager is on our friends list) I'm sure this patient will probably go down the list and send us all friend requests, however I do not feel comfortable adding her as my friend. I do not want her to feel bad about that but as I've said I don't feel it's professional. Any thoughts on this?

Specializes in Health Information Management.
wow, blocking people?! are you that scared of your patient knowing what your favorite movie is?

You all make it sound as if you've got deep dark secrets on your facebook page that you only want your close friends to see. YOU control what goes on and stays on your facebook page. YOU can control the amount of information seen by specific people. YOU can make your profile as detailed or not as you're comfortable with.

Certainly I'm not saying you should allow all your patients to be your facebook friend, but if you've established a long time connection with them already, I don't see the harm. Like someone else said, you're not inviting them over to your house for dinner. They still don't know where you live or your phone number, etc.

I don't know...maybe it's a generation thing.. :twocents:

Sorry, but I don't buy it being a "generational" thing. It's a preference issue and a situational thing, certainly, but to call it "generational" is just dismissive of the supposed old fogies who are afraid of patients knowing things about them.

Yes, there are controls on Facebook. That doesn't mean there aren't ways around them. I frequent a fair number of boards and hacks happen more often than you'd expect. And quite frankly, I'm not sure everyone has the time or interest to police their settings person by person, especially in the case of individuals with 200+ friends. Agreed, friending someone on Facebook isn't the same as inviting her home for dinner, but you don't always know who's crazy, or who has a crazy spouse/child.

I speak as someone who has had a spouse berated via a social networking site by an individual from whom he'd become estranged. With volatile friends and family members, everything can be fine one minute and the next, slanderous (libelous? I'm not sure whether such a comment would be considered speech or print) comments are being spewed out for God and everyone to see. On the other hand, it's tough to explain and justify to those individuals that you can't trust them when they're angry without giving them more ammo for a new round of histrionics. And those are the people who will confront you about WHY you haven't accepted a friend request yet!

So rather than deal with the whole mess, it seems like a good idea to avoid having a patient as a Facebook friend. I do understand the small town issues, though - I live in one and if the nurses here avoided friend requests from anyone they'd treated at the hospital or the doctor's office, they'd probably have about three friends each!

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Specializes in NICU.
While your Facebook page may seem innocuous to you, your patient may not be pleased to see a picture of you and your husband clutching drinks in your hand in the back of a limo on NYE while your friend is throwing up in the corner of the photo into a bucket.

see that's my point exactly. If you have pictures up on facebook that you're embarassed or ashamed of why are they posted in the first place? Sure, I've been out or to parties and pictures show up the next day that I'd rather not be associated with. So I un-tag myself.

What's the point of having the picture posted if you're ashamed of it somehow? I know there are ways around the privacy settings, which is why I don't have anything controversal attached to my name. Pictures of me on a beach somewhere or my pets or whatever, who cares? You're human and so are your patients, they're really no different than all of us here.

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I don't put photos up that would be embarrassing . . . I'm not a kid. ;)

I don't even think there are any photos of me that are embarrassing . . . unflattering? Maybe. :coollook: But I'm old and have wrinkles . . . . ;)

One of the subjects I talk about to my adult (in their 20's) kids is to NOT post photos that can come back to bite them but it seems that young people don't care.

I'm not going to let my 8 year old even have internet access, probably not until later high school - I learned that lesson the hard way. Bullying is a terrible problem with texting and online stuff. Plus, too much temptation for access to p0rn.

Also, never let a kid have internet access in the privacy of their bedroom and put a filter on your computer. There is a lot of vile stuff out there.

steph

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I'm still a student, but my son's primary and associate nurses both wrote down their names for me to add them on Facebook when he was discharged from NICU.(They offered, I didn't ask.) We don't communicate a whole lot - they comment when I post new pictures of my son, just things like "I can't believe how big your little preemie is!!" I wish them 'happy birthday' and 'merry christmas,' and that's about the extent of it.

I think each situation is different though, and there are situations where it wouldn't be appropriate to friend someone!

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Specializes in Med Office, Home Health, School Nurse.

If you're responsible in the first place and don't put anything stupid on FB like "getting drinks with co-workers" etc, then it shouldn't be a problem. Posting embarrassing pictures and statuses is going to cause you grief with more people than just a patient. The whole issue of Facebook drama would be solved if people would be mature and responsible about it.

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Specializes in Geriatrics, Adult Psych, Peds HH.
If you're responsible in the first place and don't put anything stupid on FB like "getting drinks with co-workers" etc, then it shouldn't be a problem. Posting embarrassing pictures and statuses is going to cause you grief with more people than just a patient. The whole issue of Facebook drama would be solved if people would be mature and responsible about it.

I don't see how "getting drinks with co-workers" is an irresponsible thing to say. It became irresponsible because she had the patient on her page, where he had access to the status updates.

It's not just "embarrassing" pictures that merit keeping my patients off facebook. I still don't feel comfortable with a patient seeing photos of my newborns NICU pictures, my grandfather's golf tournament or my wedding photos. My rule is, don't add them and don't let out you have an account.

Isn't social networking great? :rolleyes:

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It really is a generational thing. My FaceBook is for people who live out of town and I see maybe twice a year, oh and two people that live in the same City as me BUT I never manage to face to face with.

Someone from work did try to friend me and I just ignored it. Never mentioned it. I have a fairly uncommon name, only nine of us on FB and one in my city. So she knows she was ignored and she's never mentioned it.

Bur for the love of all that's holy, drop the drunken pics.

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Bur for the love of all that's holy, drop the drunken pics.

Well said! :up:

I joined initially to keep in touch with the folks I went to Vietnam with and didn't envision anything else. But then my kids joined FB after I did. And my allnurses friends. I have a few friends from work now. A couple of high school friends.

It just snowballs . . . .:uhoh3:

steph

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My kids told me not to friend them. They don't need to know everything about their Mum (not that my life isn't an open book, ask me and I'll 99% of the time give you the info you want).

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Facebook Allows you to make list and you can control what they see, so if you would like to keep in touch with a patient or two i suggest you make a patient list and control what info they can access from your facebook page.

I have a friend who was contacted by a patients boyfriend :nono: she was so freaked out she altered her name on facebook.

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Specializes in Psych, Med/Surg, LTC.

Yes, don't post any pics or status updates with alcohol involved! No pics of others drunk or making out. I don't see how general beach pics or Christmas/Birthday pics are going to get someone fired. Unless of course they are posted a day you called out sick! :lol2: There are settings for a reason. Some people on my FB can't see ANYTHING other than my profile pic, but they are still fb friends.

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One of my brothers asked to be my friend on Facebook and I told him that I do not do Facebook. I have enough problems with people from the work scene bothering me in my personal life as it is. I don't need to be encouraging anyone.

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