“How can we take the outstanding teaching of our local USF faculty to a wider audience?” This was the question asked by University of South Florida infectious disease faculty members Richard Oehler, MD, and John Sinnott, MD, now chair of the USF Health Department of Internal Medicine, asked in 2007. Their answer was USF Health’s ID Podcast series.

Now celebrating its 10th anniversary, the ID Podcast series has developed an expansive online audience, offering more than 200 podcasts with content covering the history of medicine, HIV and AIDS care, public health, tropical medicine, hospital acquired infections, STDs, and infections in immunocompromised patients.

Richard Oehler, MD, of the USF Health Division of Infectious Disease, helped establish the ID Podcast series.

The series started as a way to archive and share faculty presentations of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine Infectious Diseases (ID) Division with USF infectious disease students, residents and staff.

“We didn’t initially think this was something that would eventually attract such a large national and international following,” said Dr. Oehler, MCOM Class of 1992 graduate, ID Division faculty member since 2002, and newly promoted professor of medicine.

The first podcast was posted on the website, IDPodcasts.net, June 29, 2007, and featured a tour of the medical wing of the London Museum of Science, which Dr. Oehler had recently visited.  He originally produced the podcast to share with his colleagues within the ID Division, but the website was so well received that Dr. Oehler began uploading more podcasts.

Over the years, compelling, interesting content from ID faculty and fellows and from guest contributors is what has attracted the many thousands of online listeners, Dr. Oehler said. “The quality of our teaching is why people listen. We show off USF’s outstanding teaching every day.”

One key to the success of the series has been its adaptation to emerging technology throughout the years.  Since 2007, a plethora of technological advances have changed the way consumers get information, including the streaming media sites YouTube, Khan academy, and TED online, as well as smartphones and tablet devices.

“This is how we were able to capitalize on expanding to a wider audience. When we created the universal streaming iPhone/iPad app in 2010, it was the first ever streaming media app for USF and the entire state university system,” he said.

The ID Podcast series can be accessed by visiting IDpodcast.net

The ID Podcasts YouTube channel along with related Facebook and Twitter social media accounts have been critical in reaching a wider online audience.  The YouTube channel now has more than 600,000 lifetime views and a subscriber base of more than 3,000 from 200 countries, Dr. Oehler said, making it as popular as established national online sites for physicians and other health care professionals, such as the American Medical Association and Medscape.com.

“We regularly hear that IDPodcasts is one of the main reasons why people come to our USF fellowship and training program in infectious disease,” said Dr. Oehler. “It’s very gratifying to hear and see the positive comments on our forums given the still-modest resources we have to produce it. I know it matters. Not just to USF students, house staff and faculty, but to a medical and non-medical audiences across the internet.”

Going forward, Dr. Oehler wants to expand the site’s international offerings.  He recently created a new channel, “ID Podcasts International.”  Two podcasts on the channel were contributed from professors at Universidad CES in Colombia, and another is a skin infections lecture recorded in Mandarin by Dr. Sinnott.

“We realize there are many individuals from other countries who are not native English speakers, but who want to listen to our content,” he said.

As the series enters its second decade, Dr. Oehler and Dr. Sinnott are confident that USF’s IDPodcasts will continue to impact even more people across the globe.

Richard Oehler, MD, FACP, often gets questions about obscure infectious diseases. After all, it’s his field.But these days, Dr. Oehler gets questions from all around the world, thanks to USF’s ID Podcasts.

Dr. Oehler recently was contacted by a man in India, asking for more information about research and treatment of non-tuberculosis mycobacteria. He reached out to Dr. Oehler, associate professor and director of clinical education for the USF Health Division of Infectious Disease & International Medicine, after seeing his podcast online. His father had been diagnosed with the disease, and Dr. Oehler’s podcast had given him a better understanding of his struggles.

 Dr. Richard Oehler

The podcasts were created by Dr. Oehler and John Sinnott MD FACP FIDSA, the new chair of the Department of Internal Medicine. The Division of Infectious Disease & Internal Medicine is now celebrating the fifth anniversary of the ID Podcasts, which first went live on the website on June 27, 2007.

Fellows, faculty and other clinicians affiliated with University of South Florida’s Morsani College of Medicine have produced over 150 podcasts related to infectious diseases for the IDPodcasts.net website, making it the internet’s leading infectious diseases podcast site. After ID Podcasts made its mark as the very first infectious diseases podcast site in the nation, the co-creators started looking at other ways to disseminate their content, such as Apple’s iTunes store, which added them as a free podcast series in 2008.

With healthcare trending toward mobile web applications, co-creators Richard Oehler and John Sinnott partnered with Absolute Mobile Solutions in Tampa, FL to create mobile versions of the website. With its debut in 2009, ID Podcasts was the first streaming iphone app at USF and the entire state university system. ID Podcasts also made history in 2010 as the first ipad app created at the University of South Florida. Shortly thereafter, the ID Podcasts app became available in Google Play.

In 2011, social media features were added by integrating ID Podcasts into Facebook and Twitter. By following status updates and tweets, people everywhere can receive alerts for newly released podcasts, updates for mobile apps and more.

On January 13th, 2012, Dr. Oehler inaugurated the  ID Podcasts Youtube channel. In less than one year, the YouTube channel currently has attracted more than one hundred worldwide subscribers and 25,000 views. That means on the Youtube channel alone, USF’s infectious diseases podcasts are being viewed over 50 times a day, reaching people across the globe.

At the heart of IDPodcasts vision for spreading infectious diseases information worldwide is a goal to make it as accessible to users as possible.  All podcasts are available free of charge to anyone in multiple formats (i.e., the website, Youtube Channel, smartphone apps, etc).  Although the original intent was to provide information to medical professionals, it has become increasingly clear that IDPodcasts audience is much more diverse.

The man who contacted Dr. Oehler from India, for example, shared the story of his father’s diagnosis with a strain of non-tuberculosis mycobacteria, and how he continually battles drug resistance, medication side effects, and secondary infections. He reached out to Dr. Oehler for any information on advances in research and treatment options. He also thanked Dr. Oehler for making this podcast public, as it helped him better understand his father’s condition, which in turn greatly enhanced his understanding and appreciation of the treating physician’s decisions. At his request, Dr. Oehler also provided a personal copy of the podcast so he could share what he has learned with others.

IDPodcasts has also been instrumental in recruiting new doctors to USF.  Many physicians who have interviewed for medical fellowship and residency programs at the university have cited the podcast series as a regular part of their educational tools in learning infectious diseases (ID). Dr. Oehler hopes to someday develop IDPodcasts into a more comprehensive resource, incorporating not just Infectious Diseases content, but other medical disciplines as well.

– Story by Lindsey Bierschenk, MS, Communications Coordinator, Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine