The NIH Intramural Research Program’s Protocol Navigation Training Program presents “The NIH Social Media Policy and Social Media Use in Clinical Research”

This presentation will feature Kimberly Seigfreid, Social Media Lead in the OD Office of Communications and Public Liaison (OCPL), and Jennifer Dorsey, Social Media Coordinator in the NCI OCPL. Ms. Seigfreid and Ms. Dorsey will provide an overview of the NIH Social Media Policy (2809) and discuss the use of social media in clinical research and in the setting of the NIH Intramural Clinical Research Program.

The NIH Social Media Policy (2809), which replaced NIH Manual Chapter 2809 in July 2019, provides guidance on the use of social media by NIH employees, contractors, volunteers, students, fellows and other associated NIH staff. The Policy and the accompanying NIH Social Media Guidelines (see links below) set parameters on the use of social media by NIH staff in the context of official NIH business with the intent of minimizing risk to NIH systems and data. Other considerations in the development of the Policy and Guidelines included compliance with long-standing Federal, HHS, and NIH regulations and policies pertaining to the Hatch Act, personal versus professional use of social media, privacy and information security, information accessibility, various digital strategy efforts, human subjects research protections, and other issues impacting NIH research.

Within the realm of clinical research, NIH staff should take care to protect the privacy and trust of NIH clinical research subjects, should know the limits of sharing proprietary research and subject data, and should not misrepresent the NIH, HHS, or Federal government.

At the end of this session, participants should:

• Be familiar with the NIH Social Media Policy and NIH Social Media Guidelines;
• Know the parameters of allowed social media use during official work duty or when using NIH IT resources for authorized personal use;
• Differentiate between appropriate personal versus professional uses of social media;
• Develop proactive and reactive approaches to social media; and • Understand the importance of considering additional safeguards to human subject research protections within the setting of the NIH Intramural Clinical Research Program.

For more information about the NIH Social Media Policy, please visit the following web sites:

NIH Policy Manual: 2809 – NIH Social Media Policy: https://policymanual.nih.gov/manage/chapter/view/2809 (login required)

NIH Social Media Guidelines: http://employees.nih.gov/pages/social-media/

NIH staff and contractors can subscribe to the NIH Protocol Navigation List-serv to receive informational emails about the Program and to connect with other community members interested in protocol navigation: https://list.nih.gov/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A0=protocol-navigation