A detailed review of initiatives launched by 8 networks operating in Canada, China, Germany, Japan, USA, UK, and at global level

1. CORONAVIRUS
How Doctors’ Social Networks
Fight the Pandemic
Len Starnes
Digital Healthcare Consultant
Status
23 March 2020

2. The covid-19 pandemic requires
unprecedented levels of collaboration
and knowledge sharing globally.
Doctors’ social networks are in a
unique position to do just this
This review of initiatives, started by
doctors’ social networks to help fight
the pandemic, is designed to inform
and inspire other networks which are
perhaps considering how they too can
best help.
Content will be updated regularly as
new initiatives emerge and as other
networks contribute.

3. Content in this review is based on
direct email responses from
networks, telephone and Skype
interviews, press releases, and
blog posts.
Content was collated during the
period 16 - 23 March 2020.

4. THE NETWORKS
DXY
China
M3.com
Japan
The Rounds
Canada
Coliquio
Germany
Doctors.net.uk
UK
G-MED
Global
Doximity
USA
Esanum
Germany

5. DXY
China
World’s largest network
Over 4m members dxy.cn

6. Responses from DXY specifically address 5 questions
DXY: Most of your questions are related to data. Before answering these, I want to
highlight that data is one of three focus areas for DXY: data, content, consultation.
Q1. Has DXY been officially asked to help collate data by the Chinese government?
DXY: No. DXY was not officially asked to help to collate data. DXY choose to do this
voluntarily.
On January 21, DXY launched the map to track the virus. Coincidentally, the day before,
Dr Zhong Nanshan announced the first confirmed human-human transmission.
The DXY founders and executive team have extensive professional training and experience
in medicine and public health, so the team’s instinct was that a disease map would be the
optimal way to track the outbreak and trends of the disease. Even without information
about other aspects of the disease, we knew that making this information accessible
would be important.

7. Q2. How is the data collected?
The data is collected both automatically and manually from many sources, including
local governments. The data is in inconsistent formats, some text, word, pdf and
even image files. There is no common data format or single central source to use to
collate the data.
It is important to DXY to provide accurate data, so we made careful efforts to collect
and clean the data especially while monitoring changes accurately. Different local
governments released updated data at different times in the day so coordinating
within DXY was critical. In some cases, we sacrificed speed of release of updated
data for accuracy of that data.

8. Q3. How is the data shared with the Johns Hopkins covid-19
interactive map* (manually, automated)?
The data was shared with Johns Hopkins University in both
ways. JHU crawled the DXY data. JHU came to DXY directly to
clarify timing of updates and any changes to the data.
*https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda75947
40fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

9. Q4. Are DXY members able to provide insights/recommendations that government
resources are not?
Absolutely. For example, we noticed that in the Hubei province statistics, the city of
XiangYang was not included. After observing this discrepancy, we contacted the
provincial government and they included the XiangYang data going forward.
In addition, as the crisis developed, the city of Wuhan received most of the attention
from concerned citizens and organizations in China and around the world. We
leveraged the DXY platform to highlight that Huangshi, XiangYang, TianMen, and other
cities lacked the medical resources they needed while their case numbers grew. DXY
published requests for face masks and other medical resources and the response was
overwhelming – directly to the local hospitals who needed it.
DXY wanted to help the hospitals to save patient lives and direct resources to the right
places.

10. Q5. How does DXY see its role in taming the coronavirus pandemic during
the next 3 months?
Work still needs to be done in China.
The mission of DXY is to connect trusted professionals with each other, with patients
and with society to support more health and a better life. DXY does this by providing
data, content, and online consultation.
Over the next three months, I am optimistic the pandemic might disappear and patients
will recover. We see things moving in a positive direction. In China, DXY will focus on
educating the public about healthy lifestyles and delivering science-based messages
about the disease, prevention and treatment.
The public is eager to understand the disease and what they can do to protect
themselves. DXY will accelerate its efforts to be a leader in healthy lifestyles and
protection against COVID-19 across all of its channels, including baby care, sleep care,
skin care, mental health and others. (continued)

11. DXY will continue working with the healthcare ecosystem, including WHO China and the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to promote healthy lifestyles and relieve the concerns
of the public about disease management.
DXY also will work with other private sector companies committed to supporting
healthy lifestyles and products that help the public to do so.
Lastly, as the COVID-19 pandemic subsides, DXY plans to maintain a team to track
trends in infectious diseases including COVID-19, MERS, SARS, Zika, dengue and others.
The impact of climate change means that mosquito-borne diseases like dengue and
malaria will spread beyond regions where they have been common in the past.
Stanley Li
Chairman, DXY

12. Coliquio
Germany
Germany’s largest network
Over 190k members
Coliquio.de

13. Responses from Coliquio specifically address 3 questions
Q1. Do you host a dedicated coronavirus forum?
Yes, we have a dedicated forum where we gather all relevant insights.
Besides up-to-date articles about diagnosis and treatment, practice
management and billing, we are offering a wide range of information and
support to our doctors, for example:
- Downloadable patient information for medical practices: STOP sign for
the practice front door; inform patients suspected of being infected with
the covid-19 pathogen before they enter the practice; notice with patient
information for waiting rooms; important rules of conduct for patients.
- Interviews/Testimonials: how other doctors deal with covid-19 in practice.
(continued)

14. - Short video tutorials such as ‘Make your own hand sanitizer in 4
steps’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVmMKI7gTdc
- A hotline (via mail) for the most urgent questions from our members. The
most relevant and frequently asked questions are published on our
platform, including the answers, of course.
Naturally we closely follow all questions and comments on the forum in
order to react directly to the needs of the doctors, and to find quick and
competent solutions to their informational needs.

15. Q2. Do you provide data or recommendations to national
healthcare/public health authorities?
- We built a separate, open landing page
https://www.coliquio.de/arzt/praxis/coronavirus/covid-19-informationen-
fuer-aerzte/
with the most relevant information for ALL doctors/HCPs in Germany. The
25 most relevant medical societies in Germany have been informed about
this and we invited them to share this information with their members.
(continued)

16. - We published an ‘open letter’ to the German Federal Minister of
Health, Jens Spahn and his crisis management team, with the most
urgent demands of Coliquio doctors:
- Central coordination and information by authorities.
- Specification of the exact procedure for the procurement of
protective equipment.
- Assistance with labour law issues.
- Reliable information on the virus and the disease.
- Binding regulations for the compensation of financial losses.
(LS: Coliquio attached a PDF of the letter in their response. It was
headed ‘Open letter on covid-19: doctors feel insufficiently supported’)

17. Coliquio participated in the largest hackathon
that ever took place in Germany (or even
worldwide?), organized by the German
government and 7 tech start-ups. It drew more
than 43,000 participants, resulting in over
2,000 ideas – all submitted within 48 hours.
(continued)https://wirvsvirushackathon.org/

19. Q3. How do you see the role of your network during the next 6 months?
The development of the last few weeks has proven our role as a reliable and
capable partner for doctors. Not only because of the exponential increase in
traffic, but also because of the volume of positive feedback, and the
appreciation of our rapid content updates. We expect to become even more
relevant as our entire team work tirelessly to provide even better and faster
services.
And we offer even more: With medflex, the latest start-up company founded
by our CEO, Felix Rademacher, we offer a messaging tool (= telemedicine
app) for doctors and patients that is particularly valuable in the current
situation. More and more doctors are now open for this (telemedicine) and
we are working 24/7 to find solutions that are especially helpful in this
pandemic crisis. For example, a patient questionnaire enabling faster
identification of suspected cases of coronavirus.
Pia Kuss,
Senior Marketing Manager, Coliquio

20. Doctors.net.uk
UK’s largest network
Over 236k members
UK

21. Responses from Doctors.net.uk specifically address 3 questions
Q1. Do you host a dedicated coronavirus forum?
There is currently quite a lot of activity going on regarding COVID-19.
- NEWS: top medical news stories daily are about COVID-19.
- NEWS: we have been writing weekly news features, each on a separate
aspect of COVID-19 (these have been doing really well).
- LIBRARY: Our microbiology nuts and bolts bloggers have been
contributing blog posts. (continued)

22. - FORUM: is 90% COVID-19 content
- We launched a dedicated COVID-19 forum last Tuesday (March 10).
In less than a week, more than 350 threads have been posted, and it's
becoming a major hub for doctors seeking support, clarifying confusion,
and just having a good old rant as the crisis progresses.
We have been running COVID-19 related polls in the FORUM (promoted
in the bulletin) and on the platform landing page where appropriate.

23. We have no systematic setup to deliver data/
recommendations to national bodies other
than ad-hoc features in the press.
Q2. Do you provide data or recommendations to national
healthcare/public health authorities?

24. Q3. How do you see the role of your network during
the next 6 months?
I think that it’s become clear that we will have a vital role to
play for both clients and doctors as the situation unfolds.
For both clients and doctors, our ability to bring material from
conferences that have gone from face-to-face to virtual, and
data that was due to be presented at a conference since
cancelled, to a wide and engaged community of doctors in the
UK will be highly valuable. (continued)

25. For doctors, our ability to connect doctors in the UK via the forum and
our other services at a time of ongoing crisis is arguably unmatched in
the UK, and we have already seen the great support they are receiving
from one another over the past few weeks.
We are augmenting this with our medical news services, news
features, blog content and other clinical resources. We are planning to
extend our resources to include tailored advice on legal issues,
financial changes and considerations, mental health support and other
practical aspects relating to the COVID-19 crisis, so we become a truly
holistic hub for our members at this uncertain time.
Ria Carruthers
Head of Community, Doctors.net.uk

26. Doximity
USA
USA’s largest network
Over 1m members

27. https://blog.doximity.com/articles/covid-19-e-re-here-to-help

28. https://blog.doximity.com/articles/covid-19-e-re-here-to-help
A sincere, heartfelt THANK YOU to those on the COVID-19 front
lines. Below are some of our extra efforts to help you in this time of
crisis.
Free Dialer access expanded to all U.S. healthcare staff
Dialer in the Doximity app, historically available only to physicians,
NPs (Nurse Practitioners) and PAs (Physician Assistants), has been
scaled up to support everyone in your entire workforce through
2020. Physician-led care teams can now call patients from their cell
phone while displaying the office/hospital number on the patient’s
Caller ID. Your remote and on-the-go productivity is important for
patients, which means it’s important to us. Healthcare professionals
can request access to Dialer at: https://doximity.com/care_team. If
you're looking for Step by Step instructions, please go here.

29. https://blog.doximity.com/articles/covid-19-e-re-here-to-help
Physician-curated COVID-19 news and peer commentary
Our editorial team has curated a private COVID-19
newsroom for clinicians to access timely, aggregated
updates and recommendations from across the medical
profession, while privately sharing and discussing new
research, treatment, and best practices. We’ll also continue
to publish and disseminate member perspectives sharing
direct experience and ideas from the front lines.

30. https://blog.doximity.com/articles/covid-19-e-re-here-to-help
Free COVID-19 job posts to address surge capacity
To help your facilities manage medical staffing surge needs, we’re
offering free job posts for COVID-19 related staffing. Just fill out
the form here. We’ll then tap our network to distribute your
openings to appropriate clinicians based on location, specialty,
and any other requirements. We’ll direct applicants immediately
to the contact info you provide. You can see the list of open
COVID-19 positions here, updated as soon as we get them.
We’ll keep doing everything we can to help you. These ideas came
from our physician members. What else can we do? Any and all
ideas welcome. Let us know: What can we do to help?
From our families to yours, be well and stay safe.

31. Esanum
Germany, Austria,
France, Italy, Spain,
Switzerland, UK

33. Responses from Esanum specifically address 3 questions
Q1. Do you host a dedicated coronavirus forum? If so, what are you
observing?
We do, yes. Posts split into:
- Medical information
- Calls for volunteers / organizational matters
- Ask-the-expert sessions for fact checking the numerous fake-news reports
that patients and doctors are being confronted with (such as the impact of
Ibuprofen). This is similar to the ‘Piyao yu fanghu’ (辟谣与防护), or in
English ‘rumour protection service’, that DXY is providing on its network.
(continued)

34. We have noticed that pretty much all other non-corona related information
is not in demand right now.
Many of our (pharma) clients are increasing spending on online media such
as Esanum, but are unable to adapt their content quickly enough. They
have produced their media plans way in advance and are pushing out
information that is not hitting a nerve with the audience at all, and
therefore produces inadequate results. We are advising our clients against
continuing with this strategy and have in some cases even declined to make
valuable space available in our newsletters for these types of messages.
Such ‘news’ will not make it onto the Esanum network at this time because
nobody cares.
(continued)

35. The good thing is, most of our clients are happy to adapt and are taking our
advice. They are producing, or are allowing us to produce, better and more
relevant content, or are even pausing their general product information feeds.
Instead, they are opting to post messages such as those from Gillead HIV/HCV,
which focus on the fact that their production chain and supply is secured, and
that it is safe to prescribe their drugs even in these difficult times. THESE are
the kind of messages that HCPs are additionally interested in.
We are working very closely with our staff in Italy, Germany and France.
Esanum Italy was the first to set up a dedicated covid-19 area:
https://www.esanum.it/?tags=COVID-19
(continued)

36. In general, we are not reporting news like everyone else, but are reporting
on stories behind the news.
Like this article: https://www.esanum.com/today/posts/italy-you-cant-help-
everyone-you-have-to-choose
(continued)

37. Or Podcasts and interviews with virologists / immunologists:
https://www.esanum.de/covid-19/feeds/podcasts/posts
Or articles about the impact of home working 5 days a week:
https://www.esanum.de/today/posts/wir-ruecken-virtuell-zusammen-
gemeinsam-durch-die-corona-krise
Podcast:
Interview with professor Klaus Cichutek,
president, Paul Ehrlich Institute,
German Federal Institute for Vaccines
and Biomedicines, on the development
covid-19 vaccines
(continued)

38. (continued)
Q2. Do you provide data or recommendations to national healthcare/public
health authorities? If so, what and how?
We have introduced a dashboard comparing the states of Germany to each
other. A lot of decisions on policies in Germany are made on a regional, city
and state level, not on a national level (such as how and when to lock down a
city, what kind of businesses should close, and how to support hospitals). The
states within Germany are performing very differently.
The same happens on a country level in Europe, so I believe it makes sense to
compare the performance and show it in easy-to-grasp charts.

39. (continued)
Example:
While the map on the
the lower left just shows
the German states with
their absolute number of
covid-19 infections, we
additionally provide the
numbers per 100k
inhabitants, map lower
right, and per
1000 square metres.
These maps show the
real hot spots.

40. Example:
This chart shows the infection ‘race’
between the German states. I have not
seen this kind of chart anywhere else in
the German media and I think we are
providing a valuable service here.

41. Q3. How do you see the role of your network during the next 6 months?
Networks like Esanum are right now practically the only fast and reliable
form of communication. Medical sales reps are grounded, and meetings
and congresses are cancelled.
I see the role of HCPs’ social networks becoming ever more important as
a way to communicate, enabling not only HCPs to communicate with one
another, but additionally, enabling HCPs to communicate with national
health authorities and industry.
Tom Renneberg
CEO, Esanum

42. G-MED
Largest global network
Over 1m members
From over 120 countries
Global

43. (continued)
Statement from the CEO, G-MED
“The coronavirus pandemic demands
‘organic’ grass-roots level collaboration
and knowledge sharing within the global
medical community.
True global doctors’ social networks that
enable organic crowdsourcing are
designed to do just this.”

44. Responses from G-MED specifically address 3 questions
Q1. Do you host a dedicated coronavirus forum? If so, what are you
observing?
Yes, and it’s booming right now.
G-Med is currently running a very large global group focused on COVID-19, with
active participation of thousands of physicians from all over the world.
Physicians talk about their Real-World Experience with COVID-19 treatment,
prevention, their procedures, and insights. They are bringing up relevant
questions, clarifying issues, and sharing experiences.
(continued)

45. Topics currently being discussed include:
• Coronavirus: how is the outbreak affecting your practice?
• Approaches to coronavirus infection
• COVID-19 after recovery
• Antivirus pastille
• Hemodialysis centers
• Tests for private offices
• Nasal washing
• Germany and COVID-19
• Acyclovir and COVID-19
• COVID-19 in Brazil
• COVID-19 with zika or dengue
As always, all content in G-Med is: Global, Organic, Robust.
(continued)

46. G-MED COVID-19 discussion forum
Topic:
Treatment guidelines
Question:
Posted by US doctor
After 3 days:
18 comments
15,379 views
Germany
France
Romania

47. Q2. Do you provide data or recommendations to national
healthcare/public health authorities?
We work with data companies on COVID-19. We will be happy to
collaborate with national healthcare/public health authorities if they ask
us.

48. Q3. How do you see the role of your network during the next 6 months?
For physicians: being the largest global, organic, crowdsourcing platform for
physicians’ Real-World practice experience with COVID 19.
For the industry: being the central information and insight hub, in
additional to providing innovative tactics to engage with physicians.
Ilan Ben Ezri
CEO, G-MED

49. M3.com
Japan’s largest network
Over 280k HCPs members
Over 160K pharmacist members
Japan

50. *https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf
(continued)

51. *https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)

52. *https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)

53. *https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)

54. (continued)*https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf

55. *https://corporate.m3.com/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)

56. *https://corporate.m3.com
/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/
20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)
The dedicated covid-19
area on m3.com

57. *https://corporate.m3.com
/en/ir/release/2019/pdf/
20200312_E_vFF.pdf (continued)

59. The Rounds
Canada’s largest network
Over 20k members
+
Over 13k Canadian pharmacists &
over 15K US pharmacists on QID.io, a
pharmacist-only social network
Canada

60. The Rounds (therounds.com) is the fastest growing physician network
in Canada and has implemented 3 important measures to support its
members, medical associations and industry partners to ensure the
flow of information is maintained and the healthcare system is
properly supported.
1. Launched a COVID-19 Community to host Expert Updates, Current
Resources and Peer Discussions. We’ve removed the borders for this
community as we are working on several partnerships with key US
health systems, hospitals and medical associations. We’ve also opened
this to other key HCPs such as nurses and pharmacists that are critical
during this pandemic. We’re establishing a medical advisory group to
ensure that the community is provided relevant information in a timely
manner.

61. 2. Cancellations of physical medical conferences has impacted
every medical association for the next few months. These
events are critical for the dissemination of medical advances,
changes to guidelines, research and sharing of best practices.
We’re connecting with these medical associations to host a
virtual conference at no charge to ensure that the members or
registered participants can access the information virtually
instead of waiting for another year to go by.

62. 3. The pharmaceutical and medical device industries are key
stakeholders in the advancements and updates that their products
provide, and with their employees being restricted to work from home
until at least the end of April, we are working on solutions so physicians
in need of information will have access to that information in a timely
manner. This is in the form of live communications, virtual exhibit halls
for branded content and continuing sponsored medical education
events for therapeutic discussions.

63. We’re replicating measure #1 from The Rounds to our pharmacy network QID
(QID.io) to support over 3,000 pharmacists that are part of The Canadian
Society of Hospital Pharmacists so that they can communicate in real-time on
developments happening at their sites and stay ahead of the curve. One of our
key US partners, The California Society of Health-System Pharmacists, is
launching a community to support the California state of emergency for their
4,000 members but also to connect with thousands of community pharmacists
from Walmart, CVS and other key pharmacies to ensure that they work together
to flatten the curve.
Tim Rice
CEO, Boondoc Technologies

64. A sincere thanks to the following for their
generous help and enthusiastic support
in developing this review
• Ria Carruthers, Head of Community, M3 (EU), UK
• Ilan Ben Ezri, CEO, G-MED, Israel
• Mark Garlinghouse, DXY, UK
• Pia Kuss, Senior Marketing Manager, Coliquio, Germany
• Stanley Li, Chairman DXY, China
• Tom Renneberg, CEO, Esanum, Germany
• Tim Rice, CEO, Boondoc Technologies Inc, Canada
• Kate White, Business Insights Director,
Communications, M3 (EU), UK
• Natalie Wolfram, Public Relations Manager, Doximity, USA

65. lenstarnes@gmail.com
T: + 49 30 781 5513
M: + 49 172 1788253
Skype: lenstarnes
www.linkedin.com/in/lenstarnes
www.twitter.com/lenstarnes
www.slideshare.net/lenstarnes
Len Starnes
Len Starnes Digital Healthcare
Research and Consulting