Lisa Greene, Doctors have prescription for peace of mind, Tampa Bay Times, February 15, 2005. 'Patients come in asking for costly vitamins never proven to help. Some swear they have cancer. Others demand drugs they're sure will cure them. They read it on the Internet so it must be right, they tell their doctors. But is it? Some of the nation's leading doctors are fighting back against what they say is rampant misinformation on the Internet. Nearly 4,000 doctors in six Florida counties - Pinellas, Hillsborough, Pasco, Sarasota, Manatee and Collier - are joining in a national pilot project called "Information Rx" to send people to more reputable Web sites....Doctors in the project will write "prescriptions" for two Web sites where their patients can get more information. The first, www.medlineplus.gov is the Web site for the U.S. National Library of Medicine, an arm of the National Institutes of Health. The second, www.alzinfo.org is the Web site for the Fisher Center for Alzheimer's Research Foundation. The project is sponsored by those two groups and the AMA Foundation. Pilot programs also are under way in Iowa, Georgia and Virginia. The project is a sign of how much medical views have changed, said Dr. Donald A.B. Lindberg, director of the National Library of Medicine. When Lindberg was a student 40 years ago, doctors often believed it best to keep patients in the dark.'
Posted by
Peter Suber at 2/15/2005 08:08:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
