Some patients find Internet-based health information empowering, others find it overwhelming.
Either way, it’s here to stay and patients are going to have to get used to the growing amount of medical information available to them.
The NY Times has a nice article giving patients suggestions as they navigate through the web:
The daily bombardment of news reports and drug advertising offers little guidance on how to make sense of self-proclaimed medical breakthroughs and claims of worrisome risks. And doctors, the people best equipped to guide us through these murky waters, are finding themselves with less time to spend with their patients.
Physicians need to accept the fact that more patients are coming to them more informed about their disease. It’s up to us to help them interpret the information and to use their newfound empowerment to guide them to a mutually agreeable treatment and diagnostic course.
Many doctors are reluctant to do this. I’m saying there soon isn’t going to be a choice, we better get used to it.
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As a patient, the most useful sites I’ve found are forums for patients with the same or similar diagnoses. For example, a forum on sleep disorders helped me identify a CPAP mask that would work in spite of my having long hair — that saved my life. On such forums, if you read enough, you read enough on this kind of forum, you can sort out the nonsense from useful information. The practical solutions invaluable — related to treatment and to family issues.
As an aside, long delays in treatment (either due to problems with insurance coverage or to difficulties in getting appointments) can give patients a lot of time to read, worry, and perhaps even try some kind of treatment on their own, out of desperation. In 1997. I waited eight months for my first CPAP and was very distressed about having apneas every night. A quicker answer and clear plan with a known expected outcome can help avoid the worst of these problems.