If you?d like your health-related messages to reach more people, improve access to your online content, and increase interaction with your patients and others, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention?s new guide, Health Communicator?s Social Media Toolkit may be useful to you.

If you'd like your health-related messages to reach more people, improve access to your online content, and increase interaction with your patients and others, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC's) new guide, Health Communicator's Social Media Toolkit may be useful to you.

In the guide, the agency details various kinds of social media; shares lessons that its employees have learned about blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Really Simple Syndication feeds, ecards, games, mobile applications, and other social media tools; and provides information about the staffing and time required to use various tools. The guide also includes links to other resources and an extensive reference list.

As an example of social media use, the publication presents the CDC's efforts to communicate to the public about the H1N1 flu.