title: The state and potential of social media in bladder cancer.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Social media sites and services have become intimately woven into our interpersonal communications and have begun to stake a visible place in healthcare. Disease-specific Twitter hashtags, online patient groups and participation by patients, practitioners and advocacy groups are emblematic of this new paradigm.
  
  
  METHODS
  A literature review and summary of resources and publications on bladder cancer and social media.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A majority of Western patients have access to and use the Internet for health information. Urologists and oncologists have used bladder-cancer-specific messaging at international meetings infrequently as compared to prostate and other non-urologic cancers. An active community does participate in online discussion, with differences between medical practitioners and patients/advocates. Advice is given with the aim of unifying this discussion.
authors.affiliation: Departments of Urology and Oncology, Kingston General Hospital, Queen's University, 76 Stuart Street, Kingston, ON, K7L 2V7, Canada. leveridm@kgh.kari.net.
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Leveridge
mesh_terms: D002295:Carcinoma, Transitional Cell; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination; D020407:Internet; D061108:Social Media; D001749:Urinary Bladder Neoplasms; D014572:Urology
keywords: Bladder cancer; Oncology; Online patient community; Social media; Twitter