Web, Medicine and Health 2.0

WEB 2.0

I’m sure most of you have heard of Web 2.0.  Web 2.0 is the second generation of Internet use.  The most important aspect of Web 2.0 is that it focuses on interaction between web users themselves and web users and publishers.  User-created content takes on much more importance.

Some of the most important Web 2.0 technologies are blogs, RSS feeds, video hosts like YouTube, wikis, social networking sites like Facebook or MySpace, and web-based community sites.

MEDICINE 2.0

Medicine 2.0 is obviously the combination of medicine and Web 2.0 technologies.  It’s basically the most recent version of cyberMedicine.  Web users collaborate to exchange and share information to better their health care experience.

Medicine 2.0 involves a huge collection of health-related social networking sites.  There are waaay too many for me to look all of them up, so I’m not going to bother including any.  If there is a specific health issue you want to find a social networking site for, just look it up.  You’ll probably find something.  Or figure out how to make one yourself.  That’s what Medicine 2.0 is all about, using the web to find or create the content you want and need.

RSS feeds are basically a collection of updates from sites you subscribe to.  Instead of having to go to a site and search for new information, the site sends you a list of what’s new.  This way, patients and doctors can both easily keep up to date with the newest information on any topic they want or need to know about.

Medical blogs are an important part of Medicine 2.0.  You and I are participating in Medicine 2.0 right now, by writing and reading this blog!

HEALTH 2.0

It’s kind of tricky to distinguish between Medicine 2.0 and Health 2.0.  Obviously, they are both based on interactive Web 2.0 technologies.  Apparently, there are a lot of different definitions of Health 2.0.  According to the Health 2.0 Conference website, like Medicine and Health 2.0 themselves, “defining Health2.0 is also a user-generated phenomenon.”  The definition you find depends on who wrote the site you look at.  Like the web itself, the definitions of Health 2.0 and Medicine 2.0 are always changing based on users.

According to a study on the subject, Health 2.0 and Medicine 2.0 have five important aspects in common.

They both:

1. have the same people involved (doctors, patients, etc)
2. have an impact on traditional medicine
3. are able to personalize health care
4. promote medical education
5. have issues that come from method and tools used (like inaccuracy in user-generated content)

(If you really want a few concrete definitions, the Health 2.0 Conference About Page has its own interpretation and links to others.  A bi-weekly blog carnival called Medicine 2.0 has its own distinction between the two.)

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

Medicine 2.0 is important because it is moving the focus of health care away from doctors and towards patients.  It lets patients get together and talk about problems they’ve had and the treatments they’ve found without having to go anywhere to do it.  Patients are becoming more and more responsible for their own quality of health care and finding information to make the best of their health.

LINKS

I mentioned a bi-weekly “blog carnival” earlier in this post.  It’s called Medicine 2.0.  If you are interested in cyberMedicine (partcularly Medicine 2.0), check it out.  (The earlier link is directly to the 10th Edition, where the definition of Health 2.0 is.)

A New York Times blog about health-related social networking sites.  It contains links to a few particular sites.  There are more links in the comments at the bottom of the page.