Internet for physicians: a tool for today and tomorrow
Boyer, C.; Appel, R.D.; Griesser, V.; Scherrer, J.R.
Revue Medicale de la Suisse Romande 119(2): 137-144
1999
ISSN/ISBN: 0035-3655 PMID: 10091551 Document Number: 502844
The Internet is becoming more and more part of our habits regarding documentation and communication, thus limiting the frontiers to only that of the language. As in many other fields, the Internet is also present in the medical domain. The Internet is accessible to all, providing a technology which is simple and ergonomic and furthermore less costly. A growing number of individuals are indeed offering information, and the multiplication and diversification of documentary thus resulting renders the quality often questionable and the search for information difficult. This article firstly presents the Internet services with examples in the medical domain and more particularly in paediatrics. It then identifies the problems related to the Internet and further details three tools useful to find medical information and to surf on the Internet: Medline, a bibliographical reference search tool (from the National Library of Medicine-NLM); Medhunt, a search tool of the Health on the Net Foundation specialised in the health domain; and the HONcode, a code of ethics developed to homogenize medical information on the Internet.