Should you Google your symptoms? At this point, most people have made use of the Internet to check up on some symptoms that they’re having, and more often than not – there are results that suggest what you’re experiencing. While the Internet can be useful for many things, checking up on your symptoms is usually not one of them. There are too many things that can be displayed as a result, and it can be very difficult to get an accurate reading of what you’re experiencing.
On top of all of the possible inaccuracies, you may not be as equipped to assess your own symptoms as you might think, so you would have a hard time identifying what it is that you’re actually experiencing. So before you Google your symptoms, read on:
Information reliability
The main reason you shouldn’t feel comfortable with Googling your symptoms is that you never know who wrote what you’re reading. Any website you find online can be written by someone who isn’t qualified, and then you’ve read up on symptoms that aren’t necessarily true or linked to the result. Even if you’ve seen and heard of the website before, it’s much better to get a first-hand account from a healthcare professional that you’ve spoken to personally about what you’re experiencing.
Then you also need to consider that the information that you’ve found online could be out of date, and yet to be changed and updated to the new information. You could be reading into something that’s already been proven otherwise. The next time you experience an unusual health symptom, make sure you visit a doctor for peace of mind. If you’re struggling to receive primary healthcare, find out about a free clinic that can assist you if you need primary healthcare.
Unnecessary stress
No one wants to receive bad news, and if you’ve ever taken the time to Google your own symptoms, you’ve likely seen that your symptoms are connected to some kind of fatal disease. This can be said for a great many symptoms, which is why Googling them for yourself is quite useless.
What starts by Googling a headache or a random pain somewhere in your body can lead to you wondering if your next healthcare appointment will involve a straight catheter or a serious diagnosis from your doctor. It’s generally not worth worrying about your symptoms until you’ve received an opinion from a professional.
If you’re not convinced by the professional opinion, you should consider visiting another doctor or calling them without telling them of your previous diagnosis. Googling it and being misinformed is just going to lead you to feel a lot of stress that you could avoid.
Placebo effects
Some people, without knowing about it, are prone to feel symptoms unnaturally. If you’ve Googled your symptoms and you’re convinced that you’re experiencing what’s turned up, as a result, you might find that you start to feel more of the symptoms that were listed. This is another form of stress that you could avoid if you decided to put your trust in a professional instead.
The term of this is a hypochondriac, and while they might not actually be experiencing the symptoms, they’re not faking it either. It’s the anxiety that causes them to experience things like a placebo and can cause real damage.
We hope you understand all of the above before you Google your symptoms.