hi my name is max feinstein and i'm an anesthesia resident at the mount sinai hospital in new york
city in this video i'm going to be giving you a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into being
a doctor who runs a youtube channel if you find this video interesting or helpful i'd
really appreciate it if you liked it and subscribed to the channel let's dive in
i've had this youtube channel for about two years now and many of the videos that i film are
actually in the hospital so i thought it'd be fun to step back for a second and make a video about
some of the interesting issues that come up when filming in a hospital and posting it in a public
space like YouTube. the very first consideration that i had before i even pressed the record button
was making sure that i had the appropriate permission to have a youtube channel like
this and represent myself as an employee of Mount Sinai hospital where i'm currently a resident.
my first stop was my program director's office, so i pitched the idea of a youtube channel and making
educational videos and he was totally on board with it and just wanted to make sure that i also
had hospital-wide permission to do it as well. so my next step was to actually get in touch with the
hospital's communications department and see what guidelines i need to abide by in order to film
videos like this and post them publicly. as it turns out, at least my hospital has a handbook for
how to appropriately make and post social media. there's honestly really nothing surprising in
the handbook, and a lot of it just boils down to common sense. and the huge emphasis is on patient
privacy and making sure that that's protected. if you've watched any of my other videos you'll
notice that there are no patients in the videos whatsoever. i also personally take this a step
further and just don't show really anybody else in my videos because i want to make sure that i'm
protecting the privacy not only of my patients but also of my co-workers and other people who work
here in the hospital. it's for that reason that the principal actors featured in my videos include
myself, my dog, and a bunch of rubber mannequins. one of the other big approval issues that i try
to be mindful of is the equipment that i use to make my videos. if you'll notice in a lot
of videos i'm actually opening single-use pieces of medical equipment or medication vials just for
the purpose of making a video. but what goes on behind the scenes is i actually get in touch with
my program director, ask for permission to use the specific equipment, and also offer to reimburse
the department for the cost of the equipment. using things like epidurals, IV equipment,
airway equipment and medications is a routine part of what i put into my videos and something
that i've been given approval to use for the purpose of making them for the YouTube channel.
that's another reason why i'm really grateful for the support i've received from the department of
anesthesiology at mount sinai hospital. when i got ready to start filming my first videos in
the hospital, the first thing that i noticed was just how technically challenging it is to actually
film a reasonable quality video in an operating room. as soon as you step foot into an operating
room you'll notice that the natural sounds of the operative habitat are actually quite loud
pieces of equipment ranging from vacuum canisters on the wall
to sequential compression device machines to the anesthesia monitor itself all make
noise intermittently that you have to pin down before you start recording,
otherwise your sound quality is not going to be great. and of course getting something like a
lav mic or shotgun microphone go a long way towards helping out with this issue
lighting is another significant challenge to overcome in an operating room where the lights
that are in here by default are pretty harsh white fluorescent overhead lights.
and then there are also these OR spotlights, but those tend to be really harsh direct lights. my
current strategy for dealing with lights in here is to actually turn off the overhead
lights and turn on the OR spotlights, but bounce them up against a wall so that the
light gets a little bit more diffuse. when i'm feeling really creative i'll grab one of the
OR spotlights and actually turn that into a key light to show up in the background of the frame
pretty shortly after i got started making videos,
a medical malpractice attorney got in touch with me and made me realize
i probably should protect myself legally, so i went ahead and made a limited liability company--
is it limited liability corporation? -- anyways i made an LLC to give myself liability protection
in the event that something were to go completely awry with my YouTube channel
whether or not i had an LLC, another nice benefit that comes along with having your own business is
being able to have tax write-offs for expenses that are associated with the business. that
even includes a small but non-zero proportion of my rent and utilities for the home office that
i have where i do all of my planning and recording related to the YouTube channel.
obviously having tax write-offs comes with responsibility to not abuse the system
otherwise you'll get audited, and then your channel will get shut down, and
major problems will presumably ensue. anyways i'm not an accountant and this isn't financial
advice but i do use an accountant and i would recommend hiring one if you are
starting your own small business and would like an extra hand navigating the landscape
as you'll notice in the beginning of pretty much every video i make i introduce myself as
a resident, meaning i am not a board-certified anesthesiologist yet, i'm still in training.
and what that means is that i'm definitely not an expert in all of the things that i
bring up in my videos, so i make sure that if i'm explaining or teaching concepts, i actually
hire an attending anesthesiologist, and typically one who has sub-specialty expertise in a topic
that i need some assistance with. when i do this, i'm essentially just trying to have
a peer review process where i have somebody who is truly an expert in a topic going over
my video and giving me feedback to make sure that all of the information that i'm relaying
is accurate. in order to be fair to whoever i'm hiring to review my topic,
i actually pay an hourly rate that's commensurate with an attending anesthesiologist's hourly rate.
that's a good example of something that's a legitimate tax write-off for business purposes.
the other thing you'll notice that's in all of my videos is a disclaimer that's in the description
stating that this is not medical advice, which means i don't have a doctor-patient relationship
with viewers of the YouTube channel, so this definitely does not constitute medical advice
and that's a really important aspect of making sure that viewers understand that. that's also
why when people ask for medical advice in the comment section, i can't respond with medical
advice. i may be able to just state some general facts and point people in the right direction but
at the end of the day if someone wants medical advice they need to talk to their own doctor
it's really important for anybody who's posting videos online, whether or not you're a doctor,
to just be mindful of professionalism. for example i have a publicly available instagram account
and so it's not inconceivable that one of my own patients would, say, find one of my videos
and be linked over to my instagram account. so obviously the content on my social media
accounts needs to be professional, but that should be the case whether or not i have a
YouTube channel. the other area where it's really important to maintain professionalism online is in
the comments section below. and while the vast majority of the comments that i receive are
actually really nice, and i'm very appreciative of the kind feedback that people give me,
there are some people who come in to pretty much just be trolls. so i'm not going to spend
any time highlighting any of those troll type of remarks, but it is actually kind of entertaining
to scroll through and see what some of the trolls have to say. anyways despite the entertainment
value the trolls offer, it's really important to just keep it professional and not respond to
these sorts of comments in a way that would make you look bad. this all might seem really obvious
but there are actually quite a few unfortunate examples of doctors and medical students who
have made unprofessional commentary on social media which have resulted in disciplinary action
if you enjoyed this type of behind the scenes video, why don't you check out this video where
i take you behind the scenes of being an anesthesiology resident on a cardiac
anesthesia rotation on call. thanks very much for watching, I'll see you next time