What are reliable medical websites to find information on medical issues and ask questions?

Knowing the condition would be helpful.

WebMD is pretty reputable.

Mayo clinic and Center for Disease Controls are both good and up-to-date. (Heh)

@gailcalled up-to-date?

Dat’s a good catch.

I gotchur back.

Another vote for webmd.com.

I usually use the Mayo Clinic website.

Emedicine is a good one.

I like mayoclinic.com

For trustworthy info on a variety of topics: Health Central / Dr. Dean Edell

For skeptical reality checks: Quackwatch

WebMD
National Institutes of Health
Mayo Clinic
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
World Health Organization
National Library of Medicine

There is an foundation called Health on the Net Foundation that checks the content on medical websites. Sites can apply to be certified by this group. In order to become certified, they have to meet certain criteria (listed on the website). Once a site is certified, they can add the HON icon to their page (Mayo Clinic and WebMD have it at the bottom of their page). In nursing school, we were told that if a patient wants to get information on the web, to teach them about the HON and advise them only to trust those sites to be accurate because anyone can make a website and post any information they want, whether it is correct or not. And also to remind them that the best person to talk to about any concerns is their doctor.

@Seaofclouds World Health Organization is currently being investigated for provide false information about the H1N1 epidemic. Most of their information is probably reliable, but I would advise caution.

@YARNLADY From my understanding, the investigation is on them declaring a pandemic, not that they gave false information about what was going on.

“The Council of Europe’s Health Committee Chairman Wolfgang Wodarg has charged WHO with manipulating the definition of a pandemic in the interests of increasing the demand for the swine flu vaccine.” More information can be found by doing a search for World Health Organization Swine Flu Hoax.

@YARNLADY I’ve read it. They are questioning it because the WHO changed their definition of a pandemic prior to declaring the H1N1 a pandemic. From the latest that I read, they have found that the scientist that convinced the WHO that it was a pandemic had close financial ties to the pharmaceuticals.

That is not questioning the information the WHO gave about H1N1, just they way they rated it and why they did it. As a nurse in a doctor’s office that saw a lot of H1N1 and even had it herself, I don’t feel it was a hoax.