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The views and opinions expressed in our blog series are those of the authors and are not necessarily supported by CareSearch, Flinders University and/or the Australian Government Department of Health.
Roughly two years ago I had the good fortune of meeting a group of like-minded clinicians and academics. The interaction I have had with them has been incredibly beneficial to both my clinical and professional practice. However, we are scattered across Australia and New Zealand, and therefore we rarely meet in person and essentially only connect with each other online. I subsequently learned that the term for our group is a Virtual Community of Practice (vCoP). vCoP are becoming increasingly common and often arise from clinician connections through websites and social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. vCoP can have a range of different purposes, including sharing of research or new clinical ideas, creating a platform for inter-professional collaboration, operating as an educational resource, working as a mechanism for advocacy, and providing a means to connect clinicians with the broader community.