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The malpractice liability would make this very difficult for doctors, I'd think. And yeah, don't discount the layman. Some of us really aren't kooks, and some

by Vivtek 16y ago

The malpractice liability would make this very difficult for doctors, I'd think. And yeah, don't discount the layman. Some of us really aren't kooks, and some doctors are. The point of crowd sourcing here would be to replace an artificial quality metric (possession of an MD) with an organic one. What the medical establishment would think of this is a puzzler. Well -- no. They'd hate it with the heat of a thousand suns. But more to the point: what are the legal challenges to running this kind of service? I dunno. I'm not sure I want to find it out. But if somebody does, I'll be happy to write it.

wisty 16y ago
The medical establishment might hate the idea, but I think most doctors would like it in action. The series "House" is not a good depiction of what doctors do. "Scrubs" is a lot more accurate - busy professionals diagnosing and treating mostly unsophisticated patients.
- Vivtek 16y ago
  Yeah, all the doctors and med school students I've known, I think, would think it was pretty cool - I'm really wondering about how hard and how fast you'd get sued, though. This kind of service would really fill some serious needs out there. Seriously, if anybody wants to handle the business end of this one, I am so on board with contributing both code and semi-informed lay medical opinions.
  - barmstrong 16y ago
    Agreed this is a great idea. Could work really well with a reputation system like StackOverflow's to weed out kooks (both doctors and lay people).
radu_floricica 16y ago
Or the lack of malpractice liability might make this a success. I'm guessing many times doctors tend to go with the "safe", or common diagnosis, which wouldn't be the case here. But a certain set of dressing is probably necessary for this to work. Maybe advertise it as a training tool for students?
sambe 16y ago
I don't know how strongly I can express my agreement with this. I am not an all-out "doctors are kooks" type, but the ease with which kook-types can become doctors seems too high. I have had several bad experiences with doctors being fundamentally unscientific or ignoring what I'm actually saying or recommending treatments without logic/evidence. They are of course great if you have something simple and common like a broken leg but they are not special because they wear white coats. They don't have to get 100% on exams, they don't have to stay up to date with the literature, they don't have to be of a scientific mindset. It's a nicely paid job. There are budget/time pressures on what they can do with the endless stream of ill people.
rwhitman 16y ago
See here's the problem with the layman: Yahoo Answers. I didn't have health insurance for years and to cure some maladies I would look it up online. Forums of laypeople just get bogged down multi-page threads full of speculation and misinformation. Sure, you get some real answers once in a while but for the most part its just all anecdotal suggestions, 'you have cancer' or 'drink some more tea' type comments. Maybe the comment system for laypeople would have to be validated by some sort of 'buried until proven legitimate' type of user rating system. And as far as malpractice goes, there are many medical advice sites there are out there with legitimate doctors. Usually they just preface everything with "consult your doctor first". I think the difference between this and that would be its objectiveness - the doctors wouldn't necessarily be offering up advice, just suggesting & voting on tests and treatments. What the medical world would think of it, I don't know. That's up for the market to decide I'd think right?

by Vivtek 16y ago

wisty 16y ago

The medical establishment might hate the idea, but I think most doctors would like it in action. The series "House" is not a good depiction of what doctors do. "Scrubs" is a lot more accurate - busy professionals diagnosing and treating mostly unsophisticated patients.

Vivtek 16y ago
Yeah, all the doctors and med school students I've known, I think, would think it was pretty cool - I'm really wondering about how hard and how fast you'd get sued, though. This kind of service would really fill some serious needs out there. Seriously, if anybody wants to handle the business end of this one, I am so on board with contributing both code and semi-informed lay medical opinions.
- barmstrong 16y ago
  Agreed this is a great idea. Could work really well with a reputation system like StackOverflow's to weed out kooks (both doctors and lay people).

radu_floricica 16y ago

Or the lack of malpractice liability might make this a success. I'm guessing many times doctors tend to go with the "safe", or common diagnosis, which wouldn't be the case here. But a certain set of dressing is probably necessary for this to work. Maybe advertise it as a training tool for students?

sambe 16y ago

I don't know how strongly I can express my agreement with this. I am not an all-out "doctors are kooks" type, but the ease with which kook-types can become doctors seems too high. I have had several bad experiences with doctors being fundamentally unscientific or ignoring what I'm actually saying or recommending treatments without logic/evidence. They are of course great if you have something simple and common like a broken leg but they are not special because they wear white coats. They don't have to get 100% on exams, they don't have to stay up to date with the literature, they don't have to be of a scientific mindset. It's a nicely paid job. There are budget/time pressures on what they can do with the endless stream of ill people.

rwhitman 16y ago

See here's the problem with the layman: Yahoo Answers. I didn't have health insurance for years and to cure some maladies I would look it up online. Forums of laypeople just get bogged down multi-page threads full of speculation and misinformation. Sure, you get some real answers once in a while but for the most part its just all anecdotal suggestions, 'you have cancer' or 'drink some more tea' type comments. Maybe the comment system for laypeople would have to be validated by some sort of 'buried until proven legitimate' type of user rating system. And as far as malpractice goes, there are many medical advice sites there are out there with legitimate doctors. Usually they just preface everything with "consult your doctor first". I think the difference between this and that would be its objectiveness - the doctors wouldn't necessarily be offering up advice, just suggesting & voting on tests and treatments. What the medical world would think of it, I don't know. That's up for the market to decide I'd think right?