The Best Medical Web Sites

Thousands of Web sites offer health and medical information, but evaluating their quality can be difficult. "There's no TV Guide for the Internet," says Jennifer Wayne-Doppke, an editor for Onhealth.com. To write The 1998 Healthcare Guide to the Internet, she evaluated thousands of sites. CBS This Morning asked her to name her best finds, and to provide general guidelines to follow in searching for reliable information on the Web.

She recommends Pubmed , from the National Library of Medicine. It offers free access to Medline, which has been used for years by medical librarians and physicians at a high fee.

Two other good choices are user-friendly general search tools Hotbot and Altavista.

Anyone can publish a Web site. How can I tell the information is credible?

"You can improve your chances by starting with recognized credible sources, and go from there," says Wayne-Doppke. "You may want to ask your physician for recommendations of institutions that are doing research, or about recognized support groups."

• One symbol that you can check for that indicates that you are looking at a credible site is the "HON" code. It is the code of the Health on the Net Foundation (www.hon.ch) in Switzerland, a non-profit organization that has created standards for medical Web site providers. It is a sort of Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval for medical sites.
• Apply the same principles to the Web that you would use in any medium. Look for background information on the site about the organization or individual providing it. Make sure there is contact information on the site. If the people who put up the site act like they don't want to be found, delete that site from your bookmark list.
• Look for dates when the content was posted. It's important to get timely medical or health information.
• Look for a clear statement that the information on the site is not to be used in place of advice in person from a medical professional.

Wayne-Doppke says you should look primarily for established institutions on the Web. But that shouldn't exclude you from looking at other sites.

Here are some recommended Web sites by category.

Traditional Medicine

• www.medscape.com
  This is a medical Web site aimed primarily at professionals that provides th latest news and research about a huge array of conditions and diseases and the science behind them. It's clinically oriented, meaning it's for health care professionals to read, but it can be useful to consumers.

Disease-Specific

• www.oncolink.com
  This site is for cancer patients and their families. It has an excellent section on pediatric cancers.

Consumer Health

• www.WellWeb.com
  It's known as "Wellness Web." It provides balanced information about conventional and alternative medicine.

Patient Support

• www.komen.org
  This is the Web site for the Susan J. Komen Foundation for breast cancer. It is for women with breast cancer and researchers who are working in this area.

Parent Oriented

• www.babycenter.com
  A great site for new parents.
• www.parentsplace.com
  A good site for all parents.

What are most people looking for when they go online?

If they have just found out that they have an illness, says Wayne-Doppke, most people are looking for an introduction to what they have, and some ideas about what their next steps should be.

"If someone has leukemia," she says, "they may be saying to themselves, 'What do I do now? I'm crying every morning, my husband and I are worried about health insurance, and what about my children?'"

She adds, "What they really need is some voice out there in the wilderness who has lived with this disease to tell them how they have done it."

Online support groups are playing an important role, she notes. They are helping people who feel isolated and even neglected, perhaps because they belong to an HMO and have limited time with a doctor.

When it comes to looking for advice about alternative medicine, should you be particularly careful?

Yes and no, replies Wayne-Doppke. It's no more dangerous than the nutrition store in your local shopping mall. But she advises:

• If you are searching for alternative medicine, start with familiar organizations.
• Take a look at Healthfinder.com, a Web site from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
• Look for organizations that provide information in a journalistic way, meaning that they provide an objective and balanced third-party assessment. Be skeptical of sites that provide "magic bullet" solutions.
• Find sites run by doctors who incorporate alternative medicine, such as acupuncture and massage therapy, in their practices.

Not as a replacement for the relationship with a health care professional, advises Wayne-Doppke, but as a supplement. "It's a great place to go to get moral support in coping with a disease and to find information about the availability of a doctor in a particular area," she says.

For many people concerned about an illness, an online support group is the first stop on the Web. Wayne-Doppke advises consumers to always check out information received from support groups with a valid source. You could be taking your medical advice from a doctor, or from a fellow sufferer, or from someone who is pretending to be a medical professional.

Should medical chat rooms be monitored by health care professionals to safeguard against bad information?

• People should look for rooms with doctors if they are seeking credible scientific information on the disease they are coping with. An M.D.-moderated chat is a great place to start.

  But if you are looking for a place to converse with others, where you can get the patient perspective on dealing with the disease, then a support group with or without a doctor is a good place to go.

Should people take information they get on the Web to their doctors?

"Yes," says Wayne-Doppke. "The problem will be whether their physician will actually look at it. There is a divide between physicians who welcome it and those who don't." Her advice is to pick and choose what you bring, and don't bring in a huge pile of paper. If you can, book extra time to talk to your doctor, and choose a doctor who is willing to work with you.

Should one be wary of a diagnosis and treatment recommended on the Internet?

Again, Wayne-Doppke says yes. "You don't want to use the Internet as a substitute for advice from a medical professional, no matter how much you can check the credentials of the person you are talking to online. Diagnosing online is illegal."

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