Skip to content

The future of e-health sites

Having first hand experience on this topic, I had wanted to write about it for some time. The Los Angeles Times yesterday, published an article stating that “The curtain is falling on e-health sites as we know them, experts say. What takes their place may be a whole new way of pursuing health care online.”

For those of us that are involved with “e-health sites” that news is by no means anything new. Yet what I find interesting, is what is happening, what changes are being made, and what’s not being said.

The LA Times article discusses DrKoop.com, a for profit site that has watched it’s stock deteriorate like a nervous system after a bad vaccine reaction. Today’s check on CNET shows the stock trading at forty-one cents per share. (it was trading at forty dollars per share)

While the Koop site was supposed to be informational, many did not know what was going on in the background. For example, a listing of the top ten hospitals in the U.S., was paid for by the hospitals on the list. Conflict?

The Times article also mentions MotherNature.com, stating that they, among other sites, provided “alternative, supposedly independent, sources of medical information.” For those of you that do not know, CNET reported on November 7, 2000, that MotherNature.com announced it is shutting down. See the article, MotherNature.com can’t weather the storm.

According to the article, business analysts say that “advertising-based” web health sites are not viable and the health portals say some, “need a sugar daddy.” If your a medical web site, you can figure where the “sugar” is most likely going to come from.

The Times article sites a survey suggesting that “some 52 million Americans seek health information online at least once a month, and 21 million of them say that the information affects their decisions about care.” That can be good or bad news depending on how you look at it.

The article also states that “those millions of people generally aren’t paying for the information” (although surveys suggest some are willing to) and that the only possible way to support health care web sites, is going to be through “money from the big players.” In medicine, those big players being drug manufacturers, and possibly even government.

Think for a moment what kind of restrictions might be placed on a web site that is drug company or government funded, not to mention the results on content. Let me stress, industry analysts suggest this is the “only possible way” big health care sites will survive.

Restrictions on the internet? The LA Times suggests that most people find web sites in similar ways: “We simply start with a few search terms… and punch them into a search screen.” After that, according to the article, we are looking at a lot of options. And here is the scary part, ” some e-health observers foresee the arrival of a new type of service–a kind of online filter.” Who sets the standards on the filter, the sugar daddies?

So who do we trust? It is suggested in the article that the one expert most of us trust is “our own doctor.” The article states that “we could pose several well-informed, specific questions to our very own doctor–who knows us, who knows our personal health history, and who could provide just the answer we need.”

And just to put a December glow on your face, who are the best communicating, most caring doctors that you know in your community? You are doctor, and we don’t plan on keeping it a secret!

*Important: When visiting the Times website, save the articles for “offline viewing” by choosing file, save as, on your browser. This link will no longer be active in a week or so.

Los Angeles Times: The Web’s New Role

planetc1.com-news @ 6:01 am | Article ID: 976629696

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Pinterest

Comments are closed for this article!