(Source: TopNews.in)
Gaining sound practitional advice, in many instances, can be a painstaking process. Being passed on from one professional to the next takes time, money and patience, often only to receive a incorrect diagnosis and poor expert advice. Rather than sit in the appropriately titled 'waiting room', New Media has allowed users to access health information in an instant, linking their exact symptoms to an approximate diagnosis using sites such as MedHelp.org. I have experienced this personally, having visited 6 different professionals between 4 clinics, only to be incorrectly cleared on two seperate occasions of muscular injury.
Having this kind of access to medical information online, however, can provide a misinterpreted diagnosis of ones symptoms. Lewis (2006) raises this issue in his article Seeking health information on the internet: lifestyle choice or bad attack of cyberchondria? Cyberchondria, according to Yellowlees (2000), "occurs in anxious or hypochondriacal patients who start spending too much time chasing around the Web searching for information which may make them more anxious".
Like health supplements, which should be taken as directed in unison with physical activity and other professional advice, information and advice taken from New Media tools such as MedHelp.org should be used to narrow the scope for your local health practitioner, rather than a quick-fix or self-diagnosis of your medical condition.
Lewis, T. 2006. Seeking health information on the internet: lifestyle choice or a bad attack of cyberchondria? In Media, Culture and Society.
Med Help. 2011. Available at http://www.medhelp.org
Yellowlees, L. M. 2000. The World Wide Web is becoming a new medium of medical practice in The Medical Journal of Australia, 173 (629-630).
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