Last year, Silja Chouquet of WhyDotPharma and Andrew Spong of STweM launched a unique pan-European initiative designed to “explore and highlight how social media could revolutionize healthcare by increasing patient focus, improving access to services and gathering high quality patient outcome data.” They launched a twitter conversation community, #hcsmeu, that currently boasts an active global membership and conducts weekly lively conversations on a range of topics focusing on social technologies in the European Union and beyond.

Now, Chouquet and Spong are taking their community building and collaborative efforts offline.  On March 31, 2010, #hcsmeu will hold its first event in Berlin, the HCSMEU unConference.  Choquet and Spong were kind enough to conduct an extensive conversation with me (via e-mail) focusing on the evolution of #hcsmeu and how social technologies are impacting Europe. This is the second part of our conversation.  Click here to read part I of this interview.

5. What are the major sources people can use to find up-to-date data on Internet and social media use across the European Union? Does a Pew Internet and American Life Project like organization exist in the E.U.?

It is true that there are no pan-European initiatives at this time that could be said to mirror the enterprises you mention. However, there are some outstanding nodes of local activity such as Alex Schachinger’s fine ongoing work on the rise of the e-patient in Germany and the numerous social health informatics initiatives Mark Hawker is both chronicling and collating in the UK. One of the things that we are passionately committed to doing is connecting these points together in order to help create a Health 2.0 community that spans our continent. We frequently find ourselves saying to each other that ‘the best thing about #hcsmeu is that it is bringing us together’. Now that our growing community is finding its membership, it can also find its voice, or rather its many-voiced polyphony. Soon, we hope that these voices will sound out across Europe and resound across the ocean to the US.

6. How have European consumers and advocacy organizations responded to #hcsmeu? Have they participated in the chats?

I think we still have work to do in this regards. #hcsmeu is an inclusive community: it is important to us that everyone who has an interest in any aspect of healthcare in Europe has somewhere where their voice may be heard. You can be sure that we will all be lobbying hard within advocacy and not for profit groups over the coming months in order to make sure that we are as visible within these crucial constituencies as we would like to be. That said, if you review the #hcsmeu archives, then yes, you will find that we have made a start.

7. How do you see #hcsmeu growing and changing over the next 12 months? Are there any plans to take the movement beyond Twitter?

One of the things that has impeded our progress (and I’m not going to be too hard on us, as we’re only five months old) is the lack of a website that we could direct interested parties too. We’re delighted to say that this is no longer the case, and we are looking forward to filling hcsmeu.com with high quality information for Europeans seeking health information, patient advocates, health care professionals, the pharma industry, governmental concerns, health system representatives, regulatory bodies, and everyone and anyone else who has something to talk to us about or share with us.

We are at the end of the beginning. Our draft mission statement (http://www.slideshare.net/andrewspong/hcsmeu-mission-statement-draft) and some of the local public health lobbying undertaken by Rob Halkes in the Netherlands (http://twitter.com/rohal/statuses/6504645422) are really just markers of intent. Our new website will afford us the opportunity to embark upon some of the ambitious and far-reaching aims we have cherished since the inception of the #hcsmeu concept, but lacked the resources to achieve. Now, the case is altered and it is time to commence the next chapter in our community’s story.

We are also looking forward to holding further #hcsmeu events in mainland Europe, building upon the wonderful inaugural meeting that took place in London in September. You can learn about our unconference, HCSMEU Camp by clicking here.

8. What’s the best way for people to get involved with #hcsmeu?

#hcsmeu is driven by conversation and sharing. Conversations occur throughout the week, but our focal event takes place every Friday at 1pm CET. Search on the hashtag #hcsmeu to find what out what we are talking about, and include it in your tweets to participate. The sharing has until very recently taken the form of links to content we have found, and Gdocs we have worked on together. Our new website will shortly take sharing to a new level, however; we’ve plans to include a wiki and curated link repositories in order to make finding what you need to know about European healthcare a one-stop activity.

8. Please share some of your final thoughts re: #hcsmeu and the use of Internet and social technologies by people living in Europe.

We both agree that it is a privilege to be able to participate in a movement like this, at a moment like this. The very best thing about #hcsmeu is the community itself. In the company of the passionate, committed, brilliant individuals with whom we are proud to associate ourselves, I think the collective feeling is that no healthcare issue is unresolvable, no problem too complex.

We don’t feel that this is merely some outpouring of euphoric bravura: we have all now begun to experience at first hand the effect the power a focused community can generate and wield. We have no doubt in our minds that this self-same burgeoning community will go on to affect change in healthcare in Europe, but we need your help: join us. Make change happen.

How does online and social media health content spark action? A new tool, enmoebius, provides answers. Click here to learn more.

Read More from Walking the Path:

1. Community and Conversation via Social Media in Europe: A Dialogue with #hcsmeu’s Founders (Part I)
2. How Ángel González is Leveraging Community and Collaboration to Push Europe into the Social Age
3. Social Media Transparency – What is it Good For?: A Casual Conversation Webinar