Slashdot Mirror
The Downside of Connected Healthcare: Cyberchondria
MollsEisley writes: Like hypochondria, cyberchondria is simply a more elegant way of saying "it's all in your head" — only in this case the people self-diagnosing are using tenuous data gleaned from the Internet and our ever-connected gadgets to support their hypotheses. Virtually everyone who has put the Microsoft Band through its paces has come away with the claim that its heart rate monitor is simply bad. ... The Moto 360’s heart rate monitor doesn’t fare much better, and in only the most perfect, motionless conditions will it provide anything close to an accurate reading. These are horribly inaccurate health tools, yet they are used as bullet points for would-be buyers to cling to. ... Even WebMD—the service that has given so many cyberchondriacs the fuel to continue guessing—has a note on every single one of its countless pages that states the site “does not provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment.” And yet, that’s the one and only thing most people use WebMD for.
A recent medical study showed that frequent masturbation can actually reduce a man's chances of developing prostate cancer, as well as numerous other illnesses.
After doing a self diagnosis I've discovered I'm going to live forever.
making up new words, and doing studies for what we take for granted.
Surely hyperchondria will always find a way, the internet just makes it more efficient? In fairness to WebMD, what something is intended for and what people choose to use it for can be very different - I'd say, up to a reasonable point, if WebMD is fulfilling its primary purpose for which it was created, people need to take responsibility for the risks they take in depending on it while ignoring the advice to defer to a clinician, whether there's five of them or five hundred thousand. If they can't understand that responsibility, the problem is with the education system, not the internet.
Somebody recently pointed out that if you Google "chest pain" you could end up thinking it was harmless and you should just ignore it. They evidently hadn't tried Googling it. I continue to see ads on the TV saying, "please use your common sense if you have cold or flu symptoms to decide whether you have a serious risk, as going to your GP or A&E blocks services for others", and not "if you think you have a brain tumour, stay at home", so it seems internet self-diagnosis may not even be the primary issue. At what percentage do the few serious cases, who wouldn't have otherwise bothered going to a doctor, outweigh the number of Cyberchondriacs enabled by the same process?
Oh come now.
The reason that line exists is obviously for legal liability, it isn't any sort of evidence of how accurate (or lack of) WebMD considers their own information.
Those are the costs of "connected" healthcare. Humans are a hateful venfeful bunch and maybe those qualities served them well in the past by ridding themselves of the ill suited for humanhood, but today the homogenity these qualities aspire to will also lead to mankinds demise. Diversity is the key to survival, not "sameness".
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
WebMD once told me my sore throat and swollen lymph nodes was either a cold, the flu, or HIV.
I had a good chuckle. I wonder if the service has gotten any better over the years....
....are very similar, probably because the human body responds to different threats in similar manners. Self diagnosis is, at least today, the only way to busy bodies out of ones private business sadly.,
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
My ex-wife had a serious, debilitating condition that saw her in chronic pain and sometimes housebound.
It was only when I met her and realised that there was something wrong that I asked her about it and she realised it WASN'T normal to be in constant pain, unable to walk. But there was more than that. The doctors had put her on painkillers, antidepressants, sleeping tablets, etc. to try to ease the symptoms but nobody had actually bothered to diagnose it.
And there were odd things. Her joints were in constant pain but, when she wasn't hurting, she was able to do karate moves that Jean Claude Van Damme would be jealous of. She had an extreme range of movement. And when she was in pain, things like her knees and elbows would GO BACKWARDS, making it even more painful to do anything and making her unable to walk.
We looked up the symptoms. The first batch of hits was Hypermobility Syndrome (now called Joint Hypermobility Syndrome). The list of things is gave as common side-effects and symptoms fit perfectly, as well as a number of things that until we read them we didn't think were related at all. It's a genetic defect in the way collagen is made, which gives so many odd and unrelated symptoms that it stands out by a mile.
We printed everything off, went to the doctor. He was astounded. He'd never heard of it. He'd never realised she had the range of symptoms available to match it even if he had. He sent her immediately to a consultant specialist. In two minutes, and a simple joint-range test, he said "Yes, you have hypermobility". Within a month, she was able to claim disability. Within a couple of years, she was managing the condition and had enough support to return back to work and live a pretty normal life (even teaches karate). Because now she KNOWS what she has, she knows what to do and what not to do, and has constant, background medication of the right kind to combat the pain. At one point, she was going to be put on morphine to stop the pain because they just didn't know what it was.
It was that easy. And it wouldn't have happened without a bit of Internet research. She'd suffered for nearly 30 years with it without any diagnosis (once she was told she might have arthritis - which is an extremely common misdiagnosis of hypermobility symptoms - but they excluded it because, well, she could move her joints more than anyone else!). And she'd had suffered at least several more if we hadn't bothered to check symptoms.
Doctors aren't perfect. Don't just assume they are stupid, though. But only you know your symptoms, only you have the time and effort and impetus to find out what you have (especially if you live in a country where doctors get paid by the test, fucking disgusting), and only you are the one who will benefit if you find out what you have.
The doctor was great, once he knew we were right. He was supportive and immediately helpful. He just didn't know about every condition on the planet. And although she has a diagnosis, there is no real prognosis - the condition never gets better, but at least you can manage it. The consultant basically diagnosed her and then that was it - there's nothing you can really do, medically, to "fix" it.
So don't be a hyperchondriac and think you have everything. But if you're certain something's wrong, and you find something that matches, see what the differentials are and see if you can't get it eliminated. At the very least, if your doctors note that you asked about it and they said it "couldn't be" that thing, then you have something to go and push in their face when they turn out to be wrong. But more likely, they will try to appease you that it's NOT that thing, run a few tests, and therefore get you closer to a real diagnosis.
Internet research isn't useless, if you have half a brain.
"Who needs med school when you've got wifi?"
Physicians don't do diagnoses like they used to. They look at you, consider your condition for all of 5 seconds, and prescribe whatever will get you out of their hair. They don't diagnose, they don't think, they don't care. When I had my condition a couple of years ago, one of the doctors actually asked me what tests I wanted to run. I was like, what the fuck, how the fuck should I know? But that's how it is. So what is there to do? Do your own research on the internet and become your own pathologist. :( And unfortunately there are tons of spammer optimized-for-google pages out there for every medical condition in the world. They all have a few paragraphs of useless copy and tons of ads inline. Go to a forum? It's all the same, pages of questions and few answers. So you have to spend tons of time learning about your symptoms from the ground up, and then try to guess what you might have, and then go ask a doctor for those tests. Good luck diagnosing yourself, because doctors don't do that shit any more.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
TFA is a naked propaganda from the medical profession
They made up a new term by attaching "cyber" to one of their existing term to denote the 'foolishness' of their patients
But on the other hand, the medical profession themselves never - and dare not to - tell the world how many patients they have killed, either due to mis-diagnose, or wrongly prescribe medicine to their patients
I won't mention any other case other than one that happened to my dear old dad --- he has high blood pressure and every single day he has to take medicine to put his blood pressure back into the 'normal' range
One time a doctor (not the same doctor, but another doctor) prescribed him another medicine (for what I forgot) and when he took that new medicine with his high blood pressure pills his blood pressure shot way up, to 200 over 160, or so
Alarmed at that all the other members my family were about to rush him to the hospital, I gathered up all his medicine and ran a check online
Long and behold, the new medication, as indicated by many online sites, can *NOT* be taken with the type of high blood pressure medicine that my dad was taking
I asked him to stop taking that new medication, and within 8 hours his blood pressure dropped back to his 'normal' range (by only taking his usual high blood pressure medicine)
Yet, the medical profession tried to imply that people like me who checked information online are 'cyber' whatever
I rather be 'cyber' whatever than put my blind trust on anyone, especially those who could - intentionally or not, - prescribe me medication that can burst my arteries and veins
In the 1889 novel "Three Men in a Boat" by Jerome K. Jerome, the protagonist enters a library, gets some medical books and diagnoses himself to being afflicted by all ills known to mankind except the housemaid's knee. This makes the trope Older than Electric Lightning. Go away.
Geeks are so full of shit that "beating the crap out of them" takes a whole new meaning.
At least WebMD doesn't have editors going around changing medical articles to make them more negative and pessimistic, while no more informative or accurate than before.
It's like, The placebo effect is one of the most important contributors to patient recovery, so why are you TRYING to destroy it?
Move on, nothing to see.
Hypochondria is alive, well and getting stronger. Look how big pharma companies have been trading. Look at the slew of new "diseases" and the "disorders" that were not considered anything other than an expression of an energized growing human youth.
Personally, I use WebMD for information about something after I or a friend have been diagnosed. I guess I'm not "most people." :P
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Does this guy's summary seem like an editorial post?
So Microsoft Band does not work reliably, glad others have paid to test that out, saves me from spending my money.
I'm baffled, how being more involved in your own health is a bad thing. Oh, internet bad! Obamacare bad? This is how it has always been, don't expect others to care more about your health than you do.
Sure, some of these tech gadgets are garbage but It's better than being thrown through a gauntlet of tests that are no way related to your alignment followed by being slapped with a $5000+ bill...
I've heard this and heard this. I say, SCREW DOCTORS. Oh... I'm making you do your job by looking things up on the internet. I'm sorry if I'm messing up your "Stats" by refusing to take the random pill you suggested this week and requested an actual exam.
I've had a couple of health problems in my life that went on for years I went through doctor after doctor, pill after pill and no doctor went further than whatever the last drug rep to visit their office had suggested. In one case I had almost constant fatigue, I was falling asleep in the middle of the day, then would get manic, sweating profusely. They blew me off, told me it was "All in my head" sent me to a shrink... Then Finally my wife was watching Opra one day and that's when she had her Thyroid issues and went on T.V. to tell everyone to get theirs checked. Her symptoms were similar to some of mine so I went back to the doctor and asked "Have you ever checked my TSH?" It's a standard, rudimentary test for thyroid function that everyone should have checked once a year by most accounts. The doctor looked through my chart... nope! Sure enough I had Graves Disease. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G...
Opra Winfery diagnosed me. I'd been through probably a dozen doctors and it was a talk show host. Even then, my regular doctor and a specialist refused to do anything.. at all... saying that even medication would mess up their testing! This went on for months. I switched doctors, the new doctor also refused and suggested that the HMO had procedures he had to follow. Eventually I ended up having a Thyroid Storm: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T...
and ended up in the Emergency Room. They called an on-call Endocrinologist who was floored my levels were at what they were at and prescribed me medication and told me I needed to demand Radio-iodine treatment asap. I explained all the trouble I was having and he said "Once they get this ER bill I doubt you'll have any more trouble." He was right. I switched HMO's 2 months later.
Doctors can burn in hell. They don't care about people, they care about keeping their HMO/PPO happy and making their bonuses. I could have died because of their incompetence and focus on their bottom line.
but I've always thought it was strange that people will spend days learning about, debugging, and fixing their car or computer, but if something is wrong with them they assume they can't learn about it and help themselves.
“does not provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment” is legal butt-covering, and shouldn't be taken as anything else.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Anytime I feel like there may be something wrong with me, I consult the symptom tracker on WebMD. Do I then go into my doctor and tell them that I have x, y, or z? No. I go in there and present my symptoms to my doctor and get their expert opinion and see whether it coincides with what I read online. I don't try and steer them in any particular direction. But when the doctor decides that I should be tested for z, I can have an intelligent conversation with him about what that actually means, and whether or not that is a useful course of action for me. Should these sites disappear because of hypochondriacs? No. They will just go to the library and check out books to self-diagnose their crazy diseases. You can't fix that sort of mental disorder by hiding information from people. Does it cause frustration for doctors? Absolutely. But the doctors should educate their patients on the appropriate use for these tools. None of the doctors I know have ever had a discussion with their patients about online medical resources. They just go home and huff and puff to their friends and family how they have to fight with WebMD empowered patients.
There's no such thing as "cyberchondria", just hypochondria with people that read the internet rather than books to fuel their suspicions. Let's please stop with the made-up-just-now-term-let's-see-if-it-sticks buzzword click-bait bullshit.
People have been using the interwebs to fuel hypochondria for at least a decade. Starting with WebMD and moving on.
I was once told by someone that pretty much a huge chunk of med students develop it for a period ... because you suddenly start to know what every symptom might suggest and you start looking for it.
It's called Medical Student's Disease, and sounds like it's been referenced for over 100 years.
So, surprise. Having access to the medical descriptions of disease can make you paranoid.
Only now it's digital and anybody can do it (and then go into their doctor with their own 'diagnosis').
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Perhaps most people can't afford the crushing medical bills and insurance payments.
Example: Took friend to emergency clinic due to a fall.
Just wanted to be sure nothing was broken.
One nurse took blood pressure, asked questions. Took about 3 minutes.
One tech took one xray. Took about 5 minutes.
One doctor looked at xray and said, "nothing broken, if pain take some over-counter stuff, you can go home now" Took about 5 minutes.
We waited around over two hours for that information.
Bill arrived.
Emergency clinic: 3,800 dollars
xray dude: 500 dollars
doctor: 500 dollars
WTF ?
Now I know where the crooks hang out !
Lets all stop using the word "cyber" it's not the 90's mmmmm kay.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Actually, that's not how I envisage the meaning of the term. I made it up for myself years ago to describe people who are essentially luddites, or otherwise stumped by and suspicious of technology, and always blame the system for their own clueless user mistakes. Like those who claim they must have a virus because they "mysteriously" have 17 folders called "New Folder" on their desktop.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
morgellons
lose != loose
When you or your loved one is in the ICU, I doubt you are going to be screaming "F the doctors, bring me a tablet so I can google this!"
I remember a scene from "The Love Boat" of all places. The ship's doctor, a GP, and another doctor, a specialist, were arguing.
Specialist: "GPs know less and less about more and more until they know nothing about everything."
GP retort: "Specialists know more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing."
This was a great example of the explosion of knowledge we've had in modern times. GPs can't keep up with everything we are learning, specialists focus their knowledge. As patients we are required to navigate this landscape.
Like that one time a guy peed on his girlfriend's pregnancy test, got a positive result and posted a picture on Reddit.
Someone pointed out it was a sign of testicular cancer and saved the dude's life.
I had achilles tendonitis for three years. Three doctors and one physiotherapist were totally useless, and it was the internet that let me discover some research papers describing and evaluating a fairly simple eccentric exercise protocol that's used to treat this problem. If I didn't research this myself, I would probably still be hurting. (Several years later, my physiotherapist friend told me the other medical professionals were just idiots. That said, they are idiots with excellent reputations and reviews.) So if I have to contend with incompetent healthcare providers, I'm damn well going to second-guess them with my own research.