Our guest blogger this month explores the important topic of diagnosis and treatment through patient experience. This is particularly relevant today as it is increasingly difficult to get face-to-face time with healthcare professionals and there is a growing level of knowledge and information available online. In a survey 41% of people in the UK reported self-diagnosing from information online and in the USA this increased to 61%-85%. A Harvard study stated that searching for health information online can be helpful. The study found that people got the diagnosis right about half the time before searching online, and improved the diagnosis slightly after going online — although internet information occasionally misled them. Searching online didn’t make them anxious or cause them to choose the wrong next step. However, doctors are naturally cautious about “Dr Google” and concerned that self-diagnosis and self-treatment based on internet findings could be hazardous to health. This is why a quality patient-doctor relationship is so important and why the lived experience of a patient with a lesser known condition should be a key feature in diagnosis and treatment of AIG/PA.

Our guest blogger this month explores the important topic of diagnosis and treatment through patient experience. This is particularly relevant today as it is increasingly difficult to get face-to-face time with healthcare professionals and there is a growing level of knowledge and information available online. In a survey 41% of people in the UK reported self-diagnosing from information online and in the USA this increased to 61%-85%. A Harvard study stated that searching for health information online can be helpful. The study found that people got the diagnosis right about half the time before searching online, and improved the diagnosis slightly after going online — although internet information occasionally misled them. Searching online didn’t make them anxious or cause them to choose the wrong next step. However, doctors are naturally cautious about “Dr Google” and concerned that self-diagnosis and self-treatment based on internet findings could be hazardous to health. This is why a quality patient-doctor relationship is so important and why the lived experience of a patient with a lesser known condition should be a key feature in diagnosis and treatment of AIG/PA.