Jump to content
Judge: web sites for health
   

Web sites for health

Health consumers are concerned about information on the Internet. They want to know if information is:

  • fraudulent;


  • produced by a crank;


  • safe;


  • correct.

The Internet increases your access to health information.

  • There is a large amount of information available, much of it of good quality from reputable sources.


  • It is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and never takes a holiday.


  • You can look at sites from other countries and find out about literature, drugs and treatments not available in the UK.


  • For rare conditions particularly, it enables people to get in touch with each other.

However, along with these benefits, the Internet does bring problems and dangers.

  • There is so much information you can get overwhelmed.


  • The information is not provided in a controlled, paced way.


  • You can see information aimed at health professionals as well as at the public.


  • You can find out frightening facts.


  • Anyone can put up their own Web site, including cranks and fraudsters.


  • If you are 'vulnerable' you can fall into the trap of believing everything you read, for example:
    (a) everything you read about a condition is actually going to happen to you or the person you care for.


  • There is no person to discuss the information with as you receive it.

Good quality information can help you:

  • cope with and manage your condition;


  • care for someone with a condition;


  • live a healthy lifestyle.

But information can also put pressures on you.

  • It can provide frightening facts about a life threatening or life limiting condition;


  • It can lead to guilt that the condition is some how 'your fault' if it is genetic or contributed to by certain lifestyles;


  • It can lead to feeling 'forced' to find information or join campaigns to raise money for a 'cure'.

Hopefully the Judge project guidelines will help you to find, judge and use health information from the Internet.

 

  

© Copyright for this site is held by Contact a Family and the Information Society Research and Consultancy Group, School of Computing, Engineering and Information Sciences, Northumbria University. Site published February 2003. Last updated October 2006. Review date October 2007.