Medical advice online

Thanks to the internet and the developing technology, now we can gain some knowledge about certain diseases and symptoms. This is a link to a website that gives medical advice. The website given is only one out of the many websites that are available today. There are many ways to how the patient can gain knowledge from these websites. One is going through a questionnaire, and ultimately leads to some sort of solution. Another is directly searching for a disease using the search engine. Either way, the website will be using an expert system. An expert system is a software that attempts to reproduce a solution that an expert will give. Often these expert systems will have AI- artificial intelligence. One common method for the expert system to give a solution is, the questionnaire. By asking several questions, the system eliminates the irrelevant ones, and ultimately narrows it down to several possibilities. In order for this expert system to work, the website provider will need to have a database where all the information is stored. Now that we have seen the technical side, lets take a look at the advantages, and disadvantages.
Advantages:

• Individuals can gain sufficient knowledge about certain diseases
• Some of the websites can be used for no cost
• Easy to use

Disadvantages:

• Can occasionally be inaccurate
• Some websites require monthly payments

We should bare in mind that these websites are not doctors. Thus, using the information provided and deducing our solution is also risky. The information given in these websites are advices, and are not absolute solutions. A combination of consulting a doctor, and using the website will be the best.

Issues

Reliability- The information given must be reliable. The patients can be given the wrong information

Equality of access- Some patients may not be able to view these websites because of the lack of equipments.

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