This is one study that does not reveal
anything new to me. Members of our informal group have been talking
about this for some time. We all were disappointed when one of the
group had an appointment with a doctor for something other than
diabetes. The doctor informed him that if he went on the Internet to
search about his condition, he did not want him as a patient. Since
he knew that he would, no matter what the doctor stated, he did think
to ask a few questions.
Why would any doctor today make this
statement? What was he trying to hide? The last question was why he
would chase patients away? The doctor did say that for this
condition there was not much good information on the Internet. Our
friend did think to say why did the doctor not have a list of
reliable websites to hand out rather than drive patients away.
Doctor asked if he was intending to use the Internet and our friend
said most definitely as he used it for other medical problems, among
them diabetes, and that with a group of friends would be searching
the Internet. The doctor just stated that he did not want him back
as a patient. At least our friend stated that with this attitude, he
would not be back to a doctor that was against technology.
We have had quite a bit of fun with
this experience. A couple of phone calls were made to the office to
see if this was indeed true. The person answering the phone just
says yes, if you are a person that will search the Internet, the
doctor does not want you as a patient. This has raised other
activities like a doctor search and name search. Apparently this
doctor has succeeded in maintaining an almost zero presence on the
Internet, except for an address and office location.
In our research, we did discover that
very little was available on the Internet. What was available was
from studies that did not give out much information. The member did
get another appointment with a different doctor. This doctor did a
different series of tests and determined that the first diagnosis was
not a complete diagnosis and that two important steps had been
bypassed. The doctor asked if he was going to research for more
information on the Internet and when our friend answered yes, the
doctor handed him a list of URLs that could help. The doctor stated
that there was other information, but he did not consider much of it
as reliable. The doctor was right and had done his research. We
found several other sites, but the information was not as complete.
Back to the study which found no
evidence that the users of online health information had less trust
in their doctors than patients who did not seek information through
the Internet. Xinyi Hu, who co-authored the study as part of her
master's thesis in communication was somewhat surprised and suggested
that doctors need not be defensive when their patients come to their
appointments armed with information taken from the Internet.
“"As a practicing physician,
these results provide some degree of reassurance," said
co-author Richard L. Kravitz, a UC Davis Health System professor of
internal medicine and study co-author. "The results mean that
patients are not turning to the Internet out of mistrust; more
likely, Internet users are curious information seekers who are just
trying to learn as much as they can before their visit."”
“Almost 70 percent of the study
subjects reported they were planning to ask their doctor questions
about the information they found, and about 40 percent said they had
printed out information to take with them to discuss with their
doctors. More than 50 percent of subjects said they intended to make
at least one request of their doctor on the basis of Internet
information.”
This says a lot about what people do
with the information they glean from the Internet and that they would
not be asking questions if they thought the information was not
worthy of discussion. Doctors that are afraid of patients looking
for information on the Internet, either are afraid of their lack of
skills, or their knowledge of the topic. It is a good doctor that
says he is not up on the information for the disease or illness of
the patient and says we can learn together. This also says that the
doctor is appreciative of a patient that is proactive in their care.
While many doctors hesitate to say that
their education about an illness or a disease is not as recent as it
should be, there are some that are confident in their skills to learn
that they will challenge most patients to learn with them. These
doctors should be valued as they want what is best for their patients
and will spend the time learning so they can answer questions their
patient asks. I have even seen doctors admit they are not current in
their knowledge and refer a patient to a doctor that is current.
This says that the doctor is a caring person and realizes that they
do not have the time, or possibly even the interest at that time in
their career and are confident in knowing what is best for the
patient.
