Breast Augmentation in the Digital Era: The Power of Social Media in a Surgeon's New Practice.

[BACKGROUND] Opening a new practice is always challenging, and one of the main problems is how to engage patients. Most of them use social media to gather information about surgery and surgeons.

[OBJECTIVES] The aim was to evaluate social media's impact on a new practice, compared with a long-standing practice run by the same surgeon. Furthermore, changes in patients' and surgeons' perspectives regarding social media in recent years were studied.

[METHODS] In the 2 aforementioned practices, a questionnaire was administered to patients seen in consultation for primary breast augmentation regarding their interaction with social media before booking the visit. Another questionnaire was administered to 152 surgeons to assess their perceptions of social media.

[RESULTS] Two hundred forty-seven patients in Italy and 129 in Sweden answered the questionnaire. In the first year of the Italian practice, 97.2% of patients booked a consultation with the surgeon thanks to social media; after 3 years, the percentage dropped to 68.02%. Comparing Italian and Swedish patients, 68.02% vs 28.68%, respectively, booked a consultation with the surgeon specifically thanks to social media, 91.09% vs 79.84% did research about the surgeon before booking a consultation, and 36.03% vs 10.08% contacted the surgeon before booking an appointment. One hundred fifty-two surgeons from 24 different countries answered the questionnaire, and 77.9% opined that social media positively affected their practice.

[CONCLUSIONS] Social media is fundamental in patient-surgeon interaction and can strongly influence patient inflow, especially at the beginning of a new practice. Surgeons should be capable of using these tools to engage patients, bearing in mind the important role of these media in patients' education.