Dear WWAMI Students,

We have been discussing the Doctor-Patient relationship all semester. Part of this relationship includes discussion of medical issues and questions with your patients. With increasing availability of health information on the Internet, videos, CD-ROMs, books, magazines, newspapers, etc. (some of it reliable and some of it not reliable), patients are exposed to more information everyday. It is ever more important for you as physicians to be familiar with and keep up to date with the various available types of information and to be able to evaluate the quality and reliability of this information with your patients. The articles below are targeted firstly toward increasing your skills of assessing the quality and reliability of medical information. As an exercise, apply these assessment skills to the a sampling of the various topics concerning children and teens, and senior citizens.

The steps below relate to numbers in the gray box for specific clickable links:

1. First, please read the articles on line one in the gray box "Assessing the Quality and Reliability of Medical Information on the Internet."

2. Then, go to sample Internet Sites for "Children and Teens" and "Seniors" listed second and third below. Both of these links will provide a list of various related resources to be used in step 3.

3. Now, pick several of the sites from resource lists on the "Children and Teen" and the "Senior" links and evaluate them for quality and reliability, using the criteria from the articles on "Assessing Quality and Reliability of Medical Information" from the first step. You can use the Health-Related Web Site Evaluation Form to help you.

4. Look over other Health Related Resources: i.e.: books, videos, CD-ROMs from the "Educational Software Institute" and "Children's Software Review" (listed fourth and fifth in the box) and evaluate them for quality and reliability.

5. Find other Health related information and apply the criteria for quality and reliability.

6. Please be aware of the issues of "Cautions" and "Disclaimers" when reading this site, creating your own health related sites and viewing all other sites. Note how these cautions and disclaimers relate to the articles on Assessing the Quality of Medical Information.

Cautions and Disclaimers:

The information within this site is not intended to serve as medical advice. This information is for educational purposes and is given to help you become a more active collaborator in the patient-health care provider relationship. This web site is not intended as a substitute for the medical consultation or recommendation of a physician. This site does not directly or indirectly give medical guidance or prescribe treatment of any kind. It is crucial that each individual learns to assess the quality and reliability of information on the Internet. Please refer to Assessing the Quality of Medical Information on the Internet and read the articles that discuss the evaluation of health-related web sites. We have attempted to provide readers with the most accurate and up-to-date information available. However, the fields of medicine are continually changing. Therefore, the reader should always consult with his / her physician.

No effort has been made to independently verify the accuracy of the information provided on any of the included sites. The visitor is responsible for all actions based on the information provided. This page does not constitute an expressed or implied recommendation or endorsement of any particular product, service, event, or company, but is intended simply as a source of possible events and occurrences. The inclusion of any site in this list does not mean the compiler endorses it. We take no responsibility whatsoever with regard to the selection, performance, or use of the information listed on this or any other page. The user should be aware of the following: References from this web site to any governmental or non-governmental entity, product, service or information does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation of any of its employees. We are not responsible for the contents of any "off-site" web pages referenced from this server. Although our page includes links to sites including or referencing collections of information, we do not endorse ANY specific products or services provided by public or private organizations.

• WWAMI