The Web-Savvy Patient

I want to plug what looks like an excellent book: The Web-Savvy Patient, by Andrew Schorr and Mary Adam Thomas. I've featured Schorr before; he is a founder of Patient Power, and frequently attends Lymphoma and Hematology conferences, interviewing some of the big names in the field about their research. He does a great job of drawing out key information from them, and encouraging them to explain the implications of what they do. His co-author is an experienced medical writer. You can get a taste of their work at this link, which gives you access to a chapter of the book.

The book provides practical advice on how to use the web to find information. I can see this as being useful in two ways. The first is in finding information that patients might not know is out there, which is what the sample chapter seems to be showing. There's so much useful stuff online, it would be easy to miss it without some guidance.

But the second might be more important: as much great stuff as there is online, there is just as much that is, well, less than great. As Schorr says, lots of it is outdated, incomplete, or just plain incorrect. I can't tell you how many times people come to the support group with questions about something they've read online that is panicking them, and that they need help understanding. The web can be a great source of comfort, but it can do lots of harm as well.

I think this book will do a lot to make that situation better.