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EDITORIALS: Martin Gardner Diagnosis using search engines BMJ 2006; 333: 1131 [Full text]

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It helps me!!

Sherin Jos Payyappilly   (4 December 2006)

Accuracy of internet searches

Andrew J Larner   (5 December 2006)

It helps me!! 4 December 2006
Sherin Jos Payyappilly, FY2, Palliative Care South Tyneside Send response to journal: Re: It helps me!!	As a junior doctor in ward, online resources like emedicine have helped me in numerous occasions. I use it as a learning tool most often. As they say, when you see or hear something, if you go and read it up immediately it sticks in your mind. Computers connected to internet are ubiquitous in every ward and outpatients. I have felt that googling keeps me in advantage that I would pick up things from the net which I could have missed, there by improving delivery of patient care. But it is never a replacement to the skilful hands of a doctor. The eyes never see what the mind doesn’t know. Only if you pick up those important signs or symptoms from the patient can you search the net which will come out with the differential diagnosis. It can never replace the years of laborious toil in the medical school and from then on. These search engines could always act as a support to the medical professionals, but can never replace us! Competing interests: None declared
Accuracy of internet searches 5 December 2006
Andrew J Larner, Consultant Neurologist Walton Centre for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Liverpool, L9 7LJ Send response to journal: Re: Accuracy of internet searches	Tang & Ng suggest that web based search engines such as Google are useful for clinical diagnosis, but point out two factors which may possibly influence accuracy: the searcher's knowledge base, and the frequency of the condition.1 Some evidence to support these possibilities comes from an ongoing study of internet use by neurology outpatients prior to consultation.2 Patients and families have been encountered who have made correct diagnoses of relatively uncommon conditions such as progressive supranuclear palsy, cluster headache,3 and short-lasting unilateral neuralgiform headache attacks with conjunctival injection and tearing (SUNCT),4 whereas patients with non-specific symptoms such as headache have sometimes gone awry with self-diagnosis.5 Over a five-year period, around 40% of internet searchers were adjudged to have accessed information inappropriate to their final diagnosis, although the risk of coming to physical harm as a consequence of incorrect self-diagnosis seemed low.2 1. Tang H, Ng JHK. Googling for a diagnosis - the use of Google as a diagnostic aid: internet based study. BMJ 2006;333:1143-5 (2 December.) 2. Larner AJ. Searching the internet for medical information: frequency over time and by age and gender in an outpatient population in the UK. J Telemed Telecare 2006;12:186-8. 3. Larner AJ. Cluster headache: self-diagnosis by internet. Headache Care 2006;3:53-4. 4. Larner AJ. Headache induced by dopamine agonists prescribed for prolactinoma: think SUNCT! Int J Clin Pract 2006;60:360-1. 5. Larner AJ. What use do patients with headache make of the internet for medical information? J Headache Pain 2004;5:265. Competing interests: None declared