Thepatients_prot

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Internet was reported to be the second
source of health information after
physicians, due to its accessibility and
“easiness” of use. Most of the users
were WiFi connected and using smartphones
or laptops. The most commonly
searched types of online health
information are treatment/therapy
(62% rated it as always or often), detailed
(58%) and general (53%) disease
descriptions, drug information
(51%), side effects (51%) and scientific
articles (50%).
The most important characteristics of
a search engine are relevance and
trustworthiness of results. It seems
that the main problem is that results
currently retrieved using a general
search engine do not satisfy these requirements.
Smart search
The Health On Net foundation offers
an internet search tool which shows
you only HON approved information
sources on the web. One need to enter
a search string for
example like “knee
surgery” and selects
the category of information
according to
your user status: patient,
publisher,
medical professional
and other. The search delivers links to
trusted content in the web. All patients
should be informed about this valuable
tool by their doctors before they start
searches by themselves and getting
confused or mislead by web publishers
on health solutions with commercial
interests.
Especially in Medical Tourism quite
often a medical information is being
marketed by different channels which
lead back to some providers with a
promotional interest behind. HON offers
also with its toolbox a specified
search for only HON approved websites.
Web publishers can apply to get the
certification by fulfilling the strict criteria
.
Sources: HON and CBS local Pittsburgh
http://www.hon .ch
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