A recent article on the Guardian website raised the question of reliability of medical advice referenced on Wikipedia. In the short article Dr Luisa Dillner described how up to 70% of doctors and medical students refer to the popular website as a source of information for unusual symptoms.
Furthermore, and perhaps more surprising to some, although there are claims of inaccuracy from certain reviewers, many of the entries accurately refer to guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), leading Dr Dillner to the question of whether medical advice from such websites is ‘good enough?’
If the decision maker, be it the patient or health care provider (HCP), believes that answer to be “Yes” then a diagnosis or treatment may proceed in accordance with that information, irrespective of its accuracy, credibility or repeatability. In short, we often make ill-informed decisions based upon primed ideas or repeated experiences that feel familiar or true, a process of thinking that Kahneman refers to as Cognitive Ease (Kahneman, 2012).
This reflects a trend towards self-diagnosis that is likely to increase as more integrated technologies hit the market – a trend which raises concerns over the integrity of the information we seek and the decisions we make.
While we understand that our health care providers are the professionals and the authority on our health, we are all inherently curious, and naturally on identification of unusual symptoms or a change in health state we will seek to find further information related to probable causes or possible treatments. The article from the Guardian serves as a reminder to us all to question the reliability of information, actively seek evidence from more than one source and to always get a second opinion.
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