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BKHFHIOI.RVW   980731

"How to Find Health Information on the Internet", Bruce Maxwell, 1998,
1-56802-271-9, U$35.95
%A   Bruce Maxwell bmaxwell@mindspring.com
%C   1414 22nd Street N.W., Washington, DC   20037
%D   1998
%G   1-56802-271-9
%I   Congressional Quarterly Inc.
%O   U$35.95 +1-800-638-1710 fax +1-202-887-6706 kbeach@cq.com
%P   350 p.
%T   "How to Find Health Information on the Internet"

There are two major and important points made before the book starts. 
The preface notes, and the introduction reiterates, that all
information contained in the book, and found on the Internet, should
be checked with your doctor.  Maxwell is not a physician, and a large
amount of the data published on the net is created by people whose
level of medical expertise you have no way of checking.

Which leads to the second point.  The introduction notes that content
provided to you may be produced by people who are ignorant,
opinionated, biased, or who have a proprietary interest in whatever
they are recommending.  There are excellent general principles, and
even a list of points to check, to try and assess the quality and
validity of information or sites that you find.

Actually, the title of the book may be slightly misleading.  Only part
one, the second shortest section of the text, deals with searching for
information, and that primarily for general references or resources. 
There are listings for directories, physicians, hospitals, news
sources, libraries, and references.  Although AltaVista is mentioned
in the preface, there is no content regarding strategies to use when
searching for health information using generic search engines or other
net resources.

Part two looks at specific conditions and diseases, from AIDS to
substance abuse.  Prevention and treatment discusses alternative
medicine to drugs to women's health in part three.  A variety of
health care related issues have resources listed in part four, such as
death, ethics, and health care policies.

Grouped under the different specific topics are online resources. 
Most of these are Web sites, but there are also Usenet newsgroups and
mailing lists.  All Web sites have been visited and are described as
to contents and possible reliability.  Newsgroups and mailing lists
are described very briefly, and there is little indication that they
have been reviewed or observed for any period of time.  The index is
well organized: even when a specific area of interest is not one of
the topic headings related listings should be able to be found.

Contrary to popular belief, not all information is available on the
Internet.  If you have a specific need for medical information it is
quite possible that the knowledge you want simply does not exist
online.  With the decline in interest in shotgun "yellow page"
volumes, though, this level of reviewed and higher quality directory
information may be very welcome to the growing audience of Web users.

copyright Robert M. Slade, 1998   BKHFHIOI.RVW   980731

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