Miquella Young Young 1

13 November 2014

Prof. Sara Barski

English 121-060
The Hope of Health for Humanity

When it comes to illness, a patient has little control over the circumstance. The patient

cannot determine its start and ending times, the restrictions it puts on daily activities, or the level

if pain they are in. However, increasing amounts of medical resources on the internet have

allowed consumers more knowledge and control over their afflictions than ever before. Now

consumers do not have to reply solely on their family physicians for medical information and

diagnosis; instead, patients have credible websites and on-line doctors that can help identify and

cure them. Medical information on the internet allows consumers to conserve their time and

money, retrieve the best healthcare available to them, and become more knowledgeable about his

or her health.

With the hustle and bustle of American life in the twenty-first century, time is precious.

That is why consumers have turned to the internet to reserve their valuable time for work,

friends, and family instead of waiting lists, doctor’s visits, and prescription pick-ups. Now

customers have alternative methods of diagnosing sickness and receiving medication; there is no

need to solely rely on a physician for medical assistance. That’s why “More than two-thirds of

the public (72 percent) thinks ‘insufficient time spent by doctors with patients’ is one cause of

preventable medical errors” (Herrick, par. 3). Especially for minor symptoms, once the patients

can self-diagnose themselves from the internet, there are countless at home and over the counter

remedies that are comparable to medication that doctors would subscribe. The internet allows

this information without a costly health magazine subscription. The time it takes to receive the

magazine and skim through it to find information that is helpful to you is eliminated using the
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internet. The information you need may not even be contained in the pages of that magazine, the

books at the library or in medical schools. Instead of wasting time searching for and through

these texts, the internet saves times by being so readily available.

Time may be a treasure to many, but wealth is also a high ranking value. Spending

money on medications and doctor visits may even be detrimental to some and cause financial

crisis. The expenses in gasoline for every trip to the office, the co-pay required every time a

consumer needs to speak with their physician, and the expensive medications available at the

local pharmacies have been tolerated for years. This new internet age gives, “Access to large

amounts of medical information [that] is available through an estimated 20,000 to 100,000

health-related Web sites” (Clemmitt, par.12), as well as the option for comparison shopping for

medications. Many elderly citizens have attributed needs for several medications, which can be

costly. As a result of the newly available information on the internet, ”seniors can reduce the cost

of some common drug therapies by more than 90 percent if they use the same buying techniques

they routinely use when shopping for other goods and services on-line” (Herrick, par. 4). Seniors

do not have to change their shopping techniques and patterns to save money on medications.

Saving money in this way, especially for those with numerous or demanding medical needs, can

also be an economic incentive to pay off debt, or look into more affordable basic health care

coverage plans.

With less time and money spent attending medical necessities, there is more

margin for concern about the quality of the medical treatment being received. There is certainly

no way every physician can spend sufficient time with every patient; they are still bound by the

laws of time just like every other living species on Earth. These doctors may make mistakes

regarding any patients’ diagnosis or medication which leads, “More than two-thirds of the public
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(72 percent) thinks ‘insufficient time spent by doctors with patients’ is one cause of preventable

medical errors” (Herrick, par. 17). One way these errors can be prevented is dependent on the

patient to evaluate their symptoms and ensure they are not experiencing anything detrimental to

their health via the internet. Using the internet to double-check a physician’s diagnosis or

personal reactions to a medication can help each individual experience more successful medical

treatment. Even though there are thousands of web-sites to receive this reassuring information, a

study by doctors for the National Institutes for health discovered, “Sixty-two percent of

respondents using the Internet for health information rated the quality as ‘excellent’ or ‘very

good’… and none of the respondents rated the information as ‘poor’” (Diaz, par. 15).

Discovering information on the internet that can better your medical situation requires

independence and is often rewarding. The age of “accepting every word the doctor says” has

passed and a new age of “self-treating and self-sufficient consumers” is on the rise.

With this new rise of accessible information, many know not all of it is credible. This

may pose as an issue to some, however, “‘interactivity’ — the ease with which an online site

allows one to gather the information that meets one's own needs — ‘may be taking the place of

credibility’ as Internet users' top criterion for judging media” (Clemmitt, par. 6). With

interactivity on the rise, credibility will not be as great of a concern for on-line medical

information. The consumers are the ones using the information for their own medical needs, so

they should be the ones to judge which sites they will use and at their own discretion. It is not

that internet users are disregarding credibility of a site but are balancing the values of

interactivity and credibility to best suit individual needs. In addition, finding credible sources for

medical information may be easier to discover than other forms of information. There are easy to

identify and well-known companies and their logos that give consumers a sure fire way of
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knowing that they can trust the information they are looking at on-line. Many sites may have

similar names that include the phrasing “health” or the prefix “medi-,” but the less credible

sources can be woven out with one simple glance at the top-level domains of “.org” or “.gov.”

One can also verify their findings with their doctor or nurse over the phone or in an e-mail.

Finding the information is no longer an issue with the internet.

With more resources available through the internet, patients no longer have to strictly rely

on their primary physician. It also does not have to be solely the patient’s responsibility to verify

their health after a doctors’ visit; sometimes a visit may not even be necessary with the help of

internet resources. Secondary physicians available on-line twenty-four hours a day to discuss

medical needs. However, some argue that relying too much on the internet for health information

could be dangerous if the secondary physician is not credible or a patient self-diagnosis

themselves without doctor verification. The truth according to the study by the National

Institutes for Health is “only 9 individuals stated that they had ever purchased alternative and/or

complementary remedies from a Web site and only 1 respondent obtained a medical prescription

from an online doctor” (Herrick, par. 8). Users are simply searching for this information to verify

their doctor’s diagnoses and soothe stress from evolving or changing symptoms. A doctor cannot

predict how every person’s illness will evolve or at the pace it worsens. The internet can assure

patients they are doing ok or let them know if a hospital visit is necessary. Even users who are

not significantly ill can benefit from this supplemental information. They can find test results,

medical charts, or even e-mail their doctor with questions. No matter which way the consumers

retrieve medical information, they can always find something that would not normally be

accessible through normal means of medical communication.

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Consumers now have access to on-line medical information that gives them more

knowledge and control over their health. In this age of on-line information, it makes sense to

make use of all the new resources available. From saving time and money with less doctor’s

appointments, to an overall higher quality in medical care, the internet has revolutionized the

way people think about health and medical information on the internet. Some may question the

credibility and use of innovative ideas like secondary physicians. But interactivity and continued

communications with primary physicians ensure that on-line information will never completely

overtake the medical industry; they simply enhance it. Consumers can enjoy the luxuries of

comparison shopping and second opinions. They no longer have to rely on one individual as their

only source. To get started using these electronic jewels of information, insert symptoms and

worries into the search box and watch the screen fill with web sites with instant responses.

Discover what this health information can do to improve anyone’s life experience.
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Works Cited

Clemmitt, Marcia. "Internet Accuracy." CQ Researcher 1 Aug. 2008: 625-48. Web. 13 Nov.

2014.

Diaz, Joseph A., et al. “Patients’ use of the Internet for Medical Information” J Gen Intern Med

17.3(2002): 180-185. PubMed.Gov. Bureau of Health Professions, 17 March 2002. Web.

13 Nov. 2014.

Herrick, Devon M. "Consumer-Driven Health Care Prompts People to Spend Less on Health

Care." Health Care. Ed. Jan Grover. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2007. Current

Controversies. Rpt. from "Consumer Driven Health Care: The Changing Role of the

Patient." NCPA Policy Report. 2005. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 6 Nov.

2014.