Should patients be treated via the Internet?

Answer 1

Patients cannot be adequately assessed or treated over the internet. Treatment involves assessment-- seeing, feeling, smelling, observing, and listening to the body, as well as listening to the patient's description of symptoms. Do you know that lung conditions like pneumonia versus bronchitis sound different? And each of those sound different than a collapsed lung, or heart failure when a person is drowning in their own fluids. Do you know many infections produce certain odors? (example: a wound infection) Do you know some infections produce a certain texture, changing fluids to solids (example: a vaginal yeast infection looks like cottage cheese)

Palpation (feeling the body) finds many things. Doctors must know the difference between a normal size prostate gland in males, versus an enlarged one. Breast cysts feel like tumors to untrained hands.

We often need a person to look at or in places we can't see on our own bodies. For example, a person cannot see the middle ear canal or whether there is fluid behind the ear drum. A female can't see her own cervix to find the signs of dysplasia that can be cancerous. We can't see our own rectums to evaluate hemmoroids, or to see the signs of STDs on the back of the scrotum or around the male or female rectum.

However, some minor advice or information could be given via the Internet. But any forum, website, or person who does not also say, "You should check with your doctor," is doing wrong if they attempt to diagnose over the Internet.