One of the key questions that any doctor or dentist faces in a highly competitive marketing environment is: How to get a patient? The answer, in an increasingly Internet-dependent world, lies in becoming more Internet-friendly and adopting social media networks as a useful tool of communication with potential patients.

Social networking sites have helped people evolve increasingly into becoming empowered patients. An international healthcare market research company, Manhattan Research, conducted a study which shows that nearly a hundred million individuals in the United States have already participated in health-related Internet activity at some point of time.

More importantly, the study found that almost 46 percent of these ‘empowered patients’ had changed health decisions because of the new medical information they found on the Internet. 28 percent of the people in the study requested their doctor or dentist for a change in treatment or a change in prescription following their personally discovered information on the Internet.

Doctors who looking at ways to gain more patients need to sit up and take notice of this huge paradigm shift in the way people go about making their healthcare related choices. An average individual is increasingly relying on online information as a consumer for any kind of products. This trend is now naturally extending to the field of healthcare as well.

Doctors and dentists who are constantly faced with the challenge of how to get more patients, may take a cue from a recent Pew’s Internet and American Life Project survey that found that two-thirds of Internet-using Americans look for specific health related information online. Not just that, but 44 percent of the Internet users are specifically looking for information on doctors and dentists online.

Potential patients are increasingly visiting social networks and participating in online medical communities to find information about new treatments and suitable healthcare providers. If a doctor wonders about where, when and how to find a patient, the answer may lie in these online networks, blogs and websites.

To get an idea of how involved today’s patients are with online communities, as simple visit to the Facebook page of Tylenol or Mayo Clinic can be an eye-opener. These social networks can serve as role models for practicing doctors and dentists to help them find more patients and drive them to their medical or dental website.