Don’t be confused by the vast amount of information available on the Internet.

        With the rapid development of our society, health has become a hot topic of greater concern to modern people. In the internet era, people have a new way to seek medical advice. General knowledge of diseases, treatment methods, doctors’ blogs, Internet Q&A, etc., can be said to have everything. Some young people are accustomed to go online first, not to go to the hospital, which has gradually become a fashion, but doctors need to give you a warning – online “doctor”, can also bring hidden health risks, and even delay the disease.     The network search, not only can quickly learn the cause of the disease, which hospital treatment is the best, but also through online Q&A, online consultation, save the trouble of registration, to the hospital, in some places gradually become fashionable, for many people, especially young people favored.  The internet search for medical information large hospital rankings are often not the top.  Nowadays, there is a lot of information about health on the Internet, which can be said to be mixed and foggy. If you go online to search for medical information about a certain disease, perhaps the first thing that comes to mind are often unknown medical institutions, and sometimes the recommended rankings of the real big hospitals are not in the forefront.  In general, there are two main areas that are currently engaged in online medical services.  The first area is hospitals and clinicians. Nowadays, almost every hospital publishes information on its own portal about the hospital’s general strength, specialties, specialist’s visit time and other materials. At the same time, some clinicians, too, are used to doing online health education and medical guidance for patients.  The second main force engaged in network medical services is intermediaries. Generally, when patients register online for consultation, the website staff will answer some simple questions, such as common manifestations of a disease, diagnosis methods and general treatment. But if some more in-depth questions are asked that the website administrator cannot answer, he or she will help the patient recommend doctors. However, to contact these doctors, patients may need to pay a fee to the website to get direct access to the doctors.  I also often receive direct contact from some unknown webmasters through the website to see a doctor. It is not a bad idea for some agency websites to help patients while still making a profit. However, there are very few bad websites that will be more exaggerated in terms of propaganda to attract patients. This will not only delay the disease, but also make patients pay unnecessary financial losses in vain.  Internet consultation represents the progress of the times and the diversity of choices. But the network only provides a platform for people to search online for medical information, only to provide convenience, not to see a doctor, which is in essence different.  A real doctor’s visit must be face-to-face with the doctor in the consultation room.  Seeing a doctor is a very complicated process. In the first step, the doctor listens to the patient’s chief complaint; in the second step, the doctor conducts a detailed physical examination; in the third step, the patient may also undergo laboratory tests, X-rays or MRI. These three components are combined to arrive at a preliminary diagnosis. But it is not possible to obtain such detailed information online. For example, a patient says online that he or she has a fever or dizziness, but it is obviously impossible for a doctor to check online to see if the patient’s throat is red and swollen and use a stethoscope to determine if there are any abnormalities in the lungs.  Therefore, it is important to see a doctor face-to-face so that you can get the maximum amount of information about the disease to the doctor without delay. As an example, the other day two sons of an elderly man came to my office for consultation, saying that their mother had back pain that prevented her from getting out of bed, as well as swollen legs that prevented her from coming to the hospital. Based on their previous experience, it could be lumbar spinal stenosis again. To convince me, they brought a bunch of MRI and CT films and asked me to prescribe some painkillers for the elderly. I took a look at the films and found that the patient did have very severe lumbar spinal stenosis, while the past medical records also showed that the old man was suffering from diabetes and hypertension, but based on these materials alone, I could not conclude that this was an attack of lumbar spinal stenosis. I insisted that the sons of the old man must bring their mother to the hospital, and that they must see her face to face, otherwise they would misdiagnose and miss the diagnosis. As a result, the sons brought their mother to the hospital in the afternoon, and once examined, found that the most fatal was a vascular embolism in the lower extremity, not just the previously thought lumbar spinal stenosis.  Outpatient health education extends to the Internet patient benefits.  Online medical information is hot because many people find it troublesome to see a doctor and take sick leave to get up early to line up for a registration, but not necessarily to get one. The reason for this, and the lack of public health knowledge has a lot to do with. For example, too much reliance on famous doctors, even general illnesses have to travel a long way, a long queue to see a large hospital. In fact, similar to the cold and fever such as the disease, you can go to the community hospital, do a general examination, to exclude serious diseases on the line.  The network “see a doctor”, eliminating the need for these difficulties, according to the prescription, the disease is also good, some users will say that the doctor is great, online medical value, there is no need to delay to the hospital when you have a small disease. In fact, there are misconceptions here. When you consult a doctor online about what to do when you have a cold, the doctor can usually only say to take more vitamin C, wear more clothes, drink more water or introduce several over-the-counter medicines. Patients do as they are told, and when they get better, they say the online doctor is great. In fact, the online doctor only informs a common sense and implements health education to the patient with the help of the Internet, which is only an extension of the doctor’s outpatient service.  A proper understanding of online health knowledge as well as medical information can benefit many patients. The orthopedic department of Beijing Chaoyang Hospital is very good at diagnosing and treating scoliosis, and I often come in contact with children suffering from scoliosis. Due to the remote location, poor medical conditions and closed information, parents are not aware that the disease can be treated fundamentally through surgery. If you search the Internet for information about the disease, you will learn that there are many examples of children who have successfully undergone corrective surgery for scoliosis, and parents will try to bring their children to the right doctor, and there will be hope for their children’s future.  How to filter the vast amount of information when seeking medical treatment online.  The internet is a double-edged sword, with ample information resources and pitfalls. A mistake in seeking medical help online can cost more money and delay your child’s condition. So, how to improve the ability to screen the massive amount of information on the Internet to remove the falsehoods and keep the truth?  First, the doctor consulted by the netizen must be a doctor with a license to practice medicine in a regular hospital. For more information about the doctor’s qualifications, you can go to the Ministry of Health’s website and look up the “Practitioner Registration Search” section. You can enter the full name of the doctor into the query menu to identify the authenticity.  Secondly, the medical institution that the netizens are going to see is preferably a regular and more well-known medical institution, after all, the vast majority of China’s quality resources are currently in public hospitals. Here to remind netizens, do not expect to put any problems on the network to solve.  Third, the network to do a good job in the network before the doctor’s preparation, you can do a “doctor’s strategy”. Through the network to understand which hospital which department in a certain field is the best; can check in advance the time of the specialist, to the hospital’s bus route; can also be registered through the online appointment, to avoid the pain of queuing in the middle of the night.