[p2p-research] Important P2P Meme Often Overlooked

[marc fawzi]

Pros and cons of the Internet with respect to P2P health:

1. Cons:

Cybochondria (my own term) is the state of being a hypochondriac and having
access to all sorts of herbal and pharmaceutical drugs on the Internet.

I know of people that had ordered and received drugs via the Internet that
they should not have taken. Even herbal stuff can have adverse effects (and
almost always has unexpected effects like causing changes in hormonal
balance or straight up poisoning) and sometimes people who are hypochondriac
would tend to take many drugs at once or switch rapidly between different
drugs.  This is the result of being in a phobic state triggered by some
perceived symptom (which maybe nothing or something else) and the diagnosis
on the Internet by the person having the symptom, not a medical doctor.
This is causing serious problems for those who are predisposed to
hypochondria. I was amazed as I read about it and then came to see how
people were perscribing each other all sorts of perscription-only medicines
on online forums, Yahoo Answers, etc. And Internet pharmacy are happy to
fulfill the order and they are very superficial about requiring a real
perscription (they have rules only to protect themselves but they'll send
people any drug they want as long as they pay for it) That's the danger of
the Internet when it comes to P2P health.

2. Pros:

As Ryan suggests, trend analysis using datasets submitted by individuals
using something like an iPhone with blood sugar meter attached (the new
iPhone 3.0 allows development of such medical applications as it enables
accessory/sensor attachment) is going to be a real revlution in medicine.

I've signed up for a plasma test for allergies (I have food and chemical
allergies) with a company that is collecting data for research institutions
and pharmaceutical/biotech companies. The process involves giving blood,
waiting 4-6 weeks for results, and then if my blood sample is what they're
looking for I get to go again to give them a sample whenever a research
institution needs it. The researchers are obviously working on new medicines
for allergy sufferers like myself. If this was automated through the iPhone
using some device that can analyze the blood from one drop of blood and then
transmit the data then the process of collecting data for reserch would
become far more efficient.

Marc


2009/3/29 Ryan Lanham <rlanham1963 at gmail.com>

> This is a crucial new theme for P2P which is going unwatched...healthcare
> and test.
>
> The new iPhone (3) is going to greatly facilitate device use of nets.  That
> will revolutionize this area the way Kindle 2 is revolutionizing print. Yes,
> there were forerunners and early innovators, but this is P2P maturity
> wherein people will blast large datasets of their own health data to
> discussions and analyses and where tests are created to run all sorts of P2P
> outcomes with and without physician interactions.  Huge in the developing
> world where cell phone nets are common but medicine is rare.
>
>
> http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/self-directed-health-at-home-lab.html
>
> Smart money would bet on this as the vehicle for shattering impasses in
> health care costs.  Whole industries now are dying...banking, publishing,
> newsprint, etc. in direct P2P terms and almost no one is seeing the thread.
> Futurists, where are you?
>
>
> Ryan Lanham
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> p2presearch mailing list
> p2presearch at listcultures.org
> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch_listcultures.org/attachments/20090329/9cd2eaa2/attachment-0001.html>