When “Doc Tom” Ferguson first spoke of e-patients in the 1990s – empowered, engaged in their care, etc – those pioneering patients tended to be online. But today almost everyone’s online, empowered or not. In fact being empowered is a separate issue. And today’s “Empowered Patient” column by CNN’s Elizabeth Cohen illustrates that, by highlighting three Hollywood movies about patient engagement, all pre-World Wide Web.

She called this week – she was doing a piece for Oscar week, and the King’s Speech struck her (correctly) as a story of an empowered patient. Excerpts from today’s piece, “The Empowered Patient” Goes To Hollywood:

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I’m humbled to be one of the three people selected by Creation Healthcare for their annual “People in Healthcare Engagement Award.” Creation Healthcare advises companies on how to use social media wisely, to engage actively with their markets, transcending the old-school “We talk, you listen” approach that everyone is learning to move past. It takes new mindsets and new skills to understand how the world has changed and what to do about it. That’s what this is about.

Also honored are Janssen’s Digital Strategy & Social Media Manager Alex Butler (“Nobody should pat themselves on the back for having a Twitter account – it’s what you do with it that matters”) and Sabine Kostevc, author of the social media guidelines for Roche Pharmaceuticals, which were widely praised last year, and justly so. (If you’re interested in this culture change and you haven’t read Sabine’s guidelines, you should.)

In the announcement Daniel Ghinn writes:

Dave deBronkart personifies how the Internet has changed healthcare over the past few years. His book, ‘Laugh, Sing, and Eat Like a Pig’, published in 2010, in which he shares his incredible journey beating Stage IV cancer, is a testimony to the power of the Internet to change lives. It is also a powerful resource not only for patients but for healthcare stakeholders to learn from.

Thanks, Daniel – that’s my fondest dream: that everyone involved will realize how empowered, engaged, socially connected e-patients are changing healthcare … as it says at the top of the e-patient blog, “because health professionals can’t do it alone.” Thanks for getting it!