Is a fever good or bad?

You’re justified in wondering what a strange poser like this is doing in a magazine that describes itself as “The IT Business Weekly”. Nothing to do with enterprise computing, definitely.

Actually, an on-going medical exigency in my family has prompted me to once again turn to the Web for medical reference. And I’m simply amazed and astounded at all the wonderful stuff I’ve discovered. So, deviating from the usual ‘corporate’ format of this column, I’d like to share with you some of the awesome resources I’ve unearthed—perhaps they might help you save someone’s life some day (it may well be your own).

One of the most unpardonable failures of successive Indian governments after more than fifty years of independence has been an inability to ramp up overall healthcare levels in the country to anything near halfway-decent. So we have to struggle to survive in a chaotic and corrupt system that provides for near-zero accountability or controls, has overworked and (often) underpaid doctors and nurses, fosters rampant malpractice, and turns a blind eye to sleazy suppliers, untrained attendants and killer hospitals. The result? A suffering citizenry that succumbs as often to the rotten system in which greed, ignorance and callousness thrive, as to the ailment or disease.

If you’re not privileged, as I am, to know an honest, caring doctor, then you’re completely at the mercy of the vagaries of the primitive healthcare system prevalent in the country. Most do nothing beyond reacting with that fatalistic attitude that Indians are so (in)famous for. But the smart ones among us have discovered the power of being better informed. Not because we want to be one-up on our doctors or have no faith in them; but because we’ve learned that better knowledge of our physiology and our illnesses—and of the practice of medicine as well—would probably help our doctors diagnose more accurately and plan and monitor our treatment better.

The great thing is that, through the Internet, the power of being better informed on health and medicine is within everyone’s reach. The best starting point is either Aetna Intelihealth (www.intelihealth.com) or the Mayo Clinic (www.mayoclinic.com) or WebMD (my.webmd.com). These portals are friendly, supportive and informative—giving you excellent info on how to stay healthy, and what you need to know and do if you’re not.

With the range and complexity of drugs and medical tests available today, patients are often bewildered and sometimes terrified at what they’re being subjected to. Worse, drugs affect different people differently, and an adverse reaction or side-effect can even be fatal. It’s your right to know what’s being done to your body, and you can find out by clicking the appropriate link on the sites mentioned above, or go directly to Safemedication.com, Rxlist.com or Labtestsonline.org for more in-depth information. The last one will even give you an expert opinion on unusual results your tests might have thrown up.

For specific diseases and conditions, there are specific websites. I have yet to find a better one than HeartCenterOnline (www.heartcenteronline.com). The brilliant graphics and animation, and authoritative info on everything connected with the heart, make this the very best specialised cardiovascular website on the Internet, for doctors and patients alike. Another useful site is that of the Arthritis Foundation, at www.arthritis.org. For links to sites of medical associations and other official sites, go to Healthfinder (www.healthfinder.gov).

The world’s largest medical library, the US National Library of Medicine, provides a massive treasure trove of medical information through its MEDLINEplus service at www.medlineplus.gov. If it’s not here, it’s probably not yet been discovered; or, it’s on an Indian medical website, links to which you can find at Qmedin.com or Healthlibrary.com. Also try the excellent MerckSource.com, a service provided by pharmaceutical company Merck—through this site you have free access to valuable paid services like the multimedia A.D.A.M. encyclopaedia and the lucid X-Plain tutorials, and a host of useful interactive tools.

Of course the worst possible thing you could do would be to go to a quack website. Just because a doctor puts up his photograph and résumé on an impressive website doesn’t mean he’s a reputed physician and that the site is genuine. Peer-reviewed, non-commercial sites are the most reliable, preferably those certified by a recognised and reputed body like www.urac.org or those that follow the ‘Health on the Net’ code of conduct (www.hon.ch).

Credible medical websites are increasing the layman’s knowledge of health and disease, and making us all more aware of how our bodies work and how to take better care of them. But don’t ever expect to use the Web as a replacement for your doctor, who is after all professionally trained to treat you and cure you of all ills. And as for the fever? MayoClinic.com says that fevers seem to play a key role in helping your body fight off a number of bacterial and viral infections, hence aren’t necessarily bad. But, please do check with your doctor before you decide to sweat it out.

Val Souza, Editor
valsouza@expresscomputeronline.com