Hospitals Use Tweets From Operating Rooms, YouTube Videos Of Procedures As Marketing Tools The point of Shila Renee Mullins’s brain surgery was to remove a malignant tumor threatening to paralyze her left side. But Methodist University Hospital in Memphis also saw an opportunity to promote the hospital to prospective patients. So, a video webcast of Mullins’s awake craniotomy, in which the patient remains conscious and talking while surgeons prod and cut inside her brain, was promoted with infomercials and advertisements featuring a photograph of a beautiful model, not Mullins. This time, Methodist did not use billboards as it has with other operations, deeming this procedure too sensitive. But its marketing department monitors how many people have watched the webcast, seen a preview on YouTube and requested appointments . Hospitals are using unconventional, even audacious, ways of connecting directly with the public. Seeking to attract or educate patients, entice donors, gain recognit...