Harnessing the wisdom of the crowd in professional virtual communities

Knowledge management (KM) is an essential business practice that all organizations and especially health care providers should undertake to stay abreast of latest developments and best practices and deliver quality health care. With the explosion of health informatics, most activities for KM now take place on the Internet. However, health care professionals in resource-limited settings are often unable to access the latest literature and research, attend international conferences, discuss challenges with colleagues, and get advice from experts. Without an opportunity for discussions to occur between professionals from disparate settings and sectors that can promote knowledge creation, transfer; and feedback loops, the potential of information to have real-life impact is diminished. Professional Virtual Communities (PVCs) create these opportunities. They are vital to spreading information, identifying new research questions, and translating and testing new tools. Participants will be introduced to Global Health Delivery Online (GHDonline.org), a platform of expert-led PVCs supported by Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School where more than 8,600 global health professionals join in virtual discussions and expert panels, and access best practices and partner services at no cost. Web tools and examples of exchanges in the communities will demonstrate the potential impact of and the opportunities for engaging in PVCs for all health care providers, from an administrator in rural hospital in Nepal able to update TB infection control protocols and renovate the laboratory to a software developer in Pakistan honing in on unique patient identifiers for an electronic medical records system.