Pros and Cons of Cyberchondria

Cons of Cyberchondria 

According to multiple researchers there are both pros and cons to Cyberchondria. Cyberchondria is a disease where patients, or people who believe they are ill, will go online and search up possible illnesses instead of conferring with a physician. This has recently become a huge concern for doctors today as patients will self-diagnose themselves, and in most cases, their diagnoses will lead them into thinking they have something much worse than what they actually have. According to research, "61 percent of Americans turn to the Internet to answer questions about their health" and by the year 2007 many Americans say that they believe the internet more than they trust mass media or government health agencies. 

Doctors believe that Cyberchondria can affect people in the negative sense because the internet isn’t considering many of the factors that physicians do when they are diagnosing a patient. For example, a patient’s past family history, age, etc. Along with this factor, the Internet has so many different sources from many different people that it may be hard for many people to decipher what sources are accurate and which sources are not. This is especially a concern for older people who are not use to the new technological age. This is the case as they may not be able to decipher the different sources and may rely on a source that is unreliable.

Cyberchondria can also form and become a different type of disease called hypochondria. Hypochondriacs are patients who believe the internet more than they believe their health physicians. Hypochondriacs are so concerned about certain illnesses that when they are told they have something else they will not believe their physicians even if the patient has little to no medical knowledge.

Pros of Cyberchondria 

Although there are many negative impacts to having Cyberchondria, there are also many positive affects to this disease as well. Cyberchondria, although may lead to health anxiety in many patients, is said that even misinformed information on the internet can be a good thing for some patients because it allows patients to become more aware of their bodies and their health.

According to research, patients who research their own health problems and take an active role in maintaining their health tend to be a lot healthier than those that don’t. Research also shows that this is linked to increase health literacy among adolescence by empowering patients and helping them and doctors become partners in health care. Therefore, although Cyberchondria has many negative repercussions, it can also be a form of empowerment for patients if patients do not go to the extreme and can determine which sources are reliable and which ones aren’t and they make sure they seek medical advice before jumping into any conclusions.

Murphy, B. S. (2010). Internet Fuels Bad Self-Diagnoses and 'Cyberchondria' Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://www.livescience.com/34846-medical-website-self-diagnosis-cyberchondria.html

Cyberchondria: Do You Have Serious Health Anxiety? (n.d.). Retrieved February 21, 2016, from http://greatist.com/health/cyberchondria-do-you-have-serious-health-anxiety