Chatting about Diabetes

Just when I think there are no fresh ideas left for the D-OC, someone surprises me with a brilliant new one. This time around, the great idea was thought up by Cherise.  Tonight Cherise will launch a weekly chat about diabetes that will be held on Twitter on Wednesday evenings.  The official Twitter hashtag for these chats will be #dsma.  Cherise was kind enough to let me interview her for today's blog post.

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What is a Twitter Chat, particularly the Diabetes Chat you are launching?
The diabetes social media discussion via Twitter is in an organized discussion with various topics tweeted in question and answer format.

What inspired you to start a chat of your own?
I was inspired by Dana Lewis - she leads the Healthcare Communication discussions on twitter on Sunday evenings. I have participated in a few #hcsm topics but I usually lurk. I had my A-HA moment watching the mental health social media discussion on Twitter last week. I was in bed, hoped out of bed, ran downstairs and told Scott (husband) my idea about having an organized diabetes discussion once a week.

As a community, we tweet a lot. There was something missing. I knew we needed an organized discussion for diabetes about all things diabetes. Having a discussion once a week would not only help us grow as a community but would make us stronger while enriching the lives of others around us. Everyone doesn't read blogs or comment on them. I wanted to bring the most blogged about topics to Twitter in a Question and Answer format. I enjoy tweeting, very passionate about diabetes and people living with it. It's time to take it to the next level.

What does the #dsma hash-tag stand for?
Scottie (diabetesdaily.com) said "The hash tag must be short and sweet, but meaningful." I agreed. My first thought was the hash-tag #dsm (diabetes social media) but the hash-tag was taken for another group on twitter (not diabetes related).  The next morning I came up with Diabetes Social Media Advocacy or #DSMA. People with diabetes use social media every day to communicate their advocacy, feelings and life with diabetes, it fit the D-OC. I hope the rest of the community likes the hash tag and the meaning behind it.

What will be discussed in this chat?
The discussions will be about health, food, exercise, pumps, oral medication and meters just to name a few things.

How can someone participate?
Participation is easy. Log onto Twitter every Wednesday night at 9 pm EST, follow @DiabetesSocMed or the #dsma.  The discussion will last an hour.  If you have questions you would like me to ask please feel free to e-mail me at moderator.dsma@gmail.com.

There will be a total of 2-3 questions tweeted throughout the hour. All questions will be twitted via @DiabetesSocMed if you want to respond/answer the question.

Example:
@DiabetesSocMed: Q1: What type of diabetes do you have? #dsma
@Karen_mst: Q1: I have Type 1 diabetes #dsma

I need the diabetes communities help to make this successful. If you have questions you want me to tweet, e-mail me at moderator.dsma@gmail.com.

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I'm very excited to tweet about diabetes in an organized chat every Wednesday.  I'll be following along using my Twitter Chat tool of choice, TweetChat.

Thank you, Cherise, for coming up with this great idea and working so hard to make the chat happen.  And thank you so much for letting me interview you about @DiabetesSocMed and #dsma - even after I told you I hadn't done a blog interview before.  (Cherise made me look like I knew what I was doing though!)  I hope to see chat with you all tonight.