Is it a right, privilege, or a necessity to communicate via social networking with my doctor?

Is it  a right, privilege, or a necessity to communicate via social networking with my doctor?

The question I (http://twitter.com/glicklab (@glicklab)) recently posed to a 3rd year medical student was,:  "Is it  a right, privilege, or a necessity to communicate via social networking with my doctor?" 

I'd love to hear what you (@Susannahfox) and your followers at e-Patients.net have to say about this.  any primary sources you could recommend to us would be greatly appreciated.

As some back ground information:

    - By social networking I'm not referring to emailing with your doctor.  Which, BTW, email is an avenue of communication underutilized by  physicians.   But in some highly integrated environments, i.e., Kaiser Permanente,  has been shown to be efficient, effective at disease management, and accepted by both the patients and the medical staff.

    -  By "a right" I'm referring to the Consumer Bill of Rights and Responsibilities that was adopted by the US Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry in 1998. In it, patients have the right to accurate and easily-understood information about their health plan, health care professionals, and health care facilities. Also, patients have the right to know their treatment options and take part in decisions about your care. Parents, guardians, family members, or others that they  choose can speak for them if they cannot make your own decisions.  But currently no where does it state how this information is communicated.  Traditionally, >99% of this is done face to face, physician to patient or to their health care proxy.  But does, the option of communication via social networking need to be added to future versions of the  Consumer Bill of Rights and Responsibilities in the future? 

    - By "a privilege" I'm suggesting that at this moment, 2011, physicians are in a voluntary "op-in"  mode to participate in social networking.  In a recent American College of Surgeons Survey as high as 80% of surgeons have visited a social networking site, but most use if for personal reasons only.  Only a small percentage of us, early adaptors,  have recognized the power of social networking for patient related matters and we need to help move our colleagues from awareness and understanding to adoption and institutionalization. 

    -By "necessity" I'm asking, can we afford to miss this opportunity?  Our health care system is severely broken.   We need to get in on the proper trajectory or system will collapse because of excessive cost and less than satisfactory results.  Many solutions have been suggested and recently legislated;  time will tell if these "fixes" will work.  However, social networking may be another tool to help us control costs, improve disease management (especially chronic diseases), improve patient satisfaction, improve physician satisfaction, decrease excess utilization of services, empower patients with shared decision making, improve health literacy, and/or to help to level the playing field with information transparency to shift us from a fee for service health care market to a pay for performance health care market at both the physician and hospital levels. 

Again, I'd love to hear what doctors, patients, and  the e-pt community have to say about this.  any primary sources you could recommend to us would be greatly appreciated.