Patients Use Social Media for Customer Service — Are You Listening?

Social media is more than a publishing channel. It’s a customer experience channel.

// By Wendy Margolin //

When Laura Kuechenmeister started leading the social team at Emory Healthcare, she came with a publishing mindset. It didn’t take long for her to realize she also needed to think about social media from a customer service perspective.

Laura Kuechenmeister, former corporate director of content marketing and design at Emory Healthcare, now senior marketing manager at City of Hope, Atlanta

“Publishing is the way most brands still think about social media, even in 2026,” she says, “but early on, people started using platforms like Twitter to complain to brands about their experience.”

Retail brands have spent years training customers to use social media for complaints, questions, and customer service. Consumer habits don’t change when they’re dealing with a healthcare organization, even when their private health information is involved.

But healthcare organizations haven’t kept pace. Kuechenmeister comments, “Even though it’s been happening for so long, in the healthcare space we worry about the risk of engaging in public comments with people who might be prospective patients, and so we’ve really restrained ourselves.”

But she counters, “Despite the risk, there are real opportunities to build trust appropriately, and ensure compliance with regulatory standards.”

Read the full article to learn why healthcare marketers need to consider social media an important customer service channel.

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