Internet-induced health anxiety - Cyberchondria?

[axolotl]

I agree with keekee. I have asked the question myself. That is, before the internet became easily accessible to everyone, including grandma and grandpa was the incidence of health anxiety significantly different? I believe it was. Before the internet people really only had access to information in hard copy. I remember when I was young my mum had a big medical book which she would look things up in. If she looked up something like liver cancer (hypothetical) there would be one or two paragraphs covering the topic. After all only a certain amount of space can be given over to covering hundreds of medical conditions lol. Now if you were to type liver cancer into Google you would get thousands of paragraphs about liver cancer. With the book you have no choice except to stop reading because of the limited information. The information you can read on the internet is almost unlimited. 15 or so years ago I had my first HA experience. I had the internet but there was a lot less information about medical conditions so I didn't bother looking things up. My next experience of HA was more than 10 years later and by then the internet had become a mine of information. And like most HA sufferers I spent hours every day Googling symptoms etc etc My psychiatrist said to me one day that he wanted me to promise him that I would stop doing it. I did promise him and I usually stick to my promises so from then on I stopped googling. I had the same psychiatrist 15 years ago and he didn't need to ask me to do that. I think your research is fascinating and I would like to read your conclusions. Good luck.

I don't disagree with anything you're saying, but there is also the flipside of this that the two paragraphs in your grand-parents' medical dictionary didn't offer the mine of information we have about the chances of not having cancer either, that are also on the Internet. The problem isn't the Internet, it's the Internet in the hands of an anxious mind.

And it's not just medical stuff - when I was moving house, I got into an anxious state poring over crime statistics of the new area, that I wouldn't have had access to in analogue times. When I get anxiety about world events, I can find any opinion or "fact" to back up virtually anything. The information age is wonderful, I genuinely believe that, but it's also overwhelming and difficult for handling anxiety of any kind - not just medical.

And also before the Internet, if your grandparents did find themselves suffering from anxiety, they wouldn't be able to chat in a place like this for help, advice, support, etc...?

[swajj]

No but they were more likely to accept their doctor's opinion. It was my mother who owned the medical book not my grandparents. My mother didn't have HA and she didn't know how to use the internet. I understand what you are saying. However if the OP's hypothesis was "The incidence of health anxiety has increased significantly since the advent of the internet" I believe her conclusion would be that it has increased significantly. But I agree with you that without the Internet forums like this one wouldn't exist. However, I might then go on to suggest that this forum should be avoided by some who frequent here because it can act as a trigger. Perhaps not by you or I but definitely by some.

[axolotl]

It is certainly a good topic for research, I agree - I'm not suggesting it's not in any of this, just it's a tricky one to necessary ascribe cause and effect to.

Is technology a causer or a facilitator of anxiety? Does it increase the number of people with HA, or simply amplify or change their behaviour? Is any increase in irrational health anxiety offset by people who may have been health anxious and made numerous doctors' appointments without information, but perhaps now are logical enough to navigate online information and talk themselves out of irrationality? How easy is it to differentiate between the two groups? Is it now easier to see HA because HA sufferers congregrate in online space?

[MyNameIsTerry]

Hello all!

For years, I've struggled with health anxiety, whether it has been chest pains giving me heart attack fears, headaches giving me brain tumor fears, or tingling extremities producing fears of a serious neurological condition. Every time I noticed a symptom, I'd search it online. Often, this searching ended up escalating my anxiety, as I'd always be prompted with webpages suggesting I had some kind of serious condition.

As a college student, I partnered up with some health professionals and spent the last few weeks researching this kind of internet-induced health anxiety (cyberchondria). Along with writing a paper on the topic, I've started to create a website in hopes of helping other people who deal with internet-induced health anxiety. The link to this website is on my profile page - I'd love suggestions or comments about it from people who have dealt with this condition in the past.

Has anybody else found that their internet searches have fueled their health anxiety? If so, do you want to share your experience?

Look at excellent responses, particularly from SLA & axolotl (excellent description of the impact of Cognitive Distortions, axolotl).

Are you asking the right question? Is it induces in that it creates anxiety disorder or merely fuels an existing one? You state you were an existing one so it seems the latter but this new label suggests the Internet directly creates it, which I think is a different issue.

I don't have HA so I'll add an example I share (or did) with people on the GAD board. When I was still pretty bad if I read about social unrest, war, terrorism, etc it triggered my GAD. Different to HA being triggered by reading, or rather applying Confirmation Bias, to their symptoms? Nope. Not that different, just that mine was less direct. But then, how could you plan a world around mental health conditions...imagine the censorship all because some people struggle to interpret things correctly?

So, is the news detrimental to people like me? Yep, but then so would reading a book too.

An interesting observation you might want to consider is old sitcoms. Have you ever heard of One Foot In The Grave? Victor has an old medical book. When he consults it he comes up with cancers or other life threatening diseases. His wife tells him off and funnily enough, she says what people on here say. "Stop reading that book, you're not a doctor, you will just convince yourself you have X and worry all week"

They didn't have the Internet back in those days.

[swajj]

lol axolotl maybe all will be revealed if we ever get to read the OP's paper. ��

[Colicab85]

Google didn't cause my HA but it certainly increased and perpetuated it.

It validated my worries with "evidence".

I would NEVER EVER recommend anyone googling

[Primula]

I had HA before the internet. I used to spend all my lunch hours in the medical section of the book shop looking up medical symptoms. The difference is that on the weekend I had no access to the bookshops, so my fear would die down a little. Over the past years with internet access it has become easier to research symptoms, but as others have said, Google is a tool and it's up to you how you use it, and its never a good idea to google symptoms if you are an anxiety sufferer.

[cyberchondriaguy]

SLA: I agree - the anxiety begins in us. However, I I want to clear up something that you’ve said - I think that there is more misinformation online than we think. Some websites (particularly government/organizational websites) have been shown to have much more accurate medical information than other websites (medical blogs/forums such as this one). That’s not to say that forums like this aren’t immensely helpful for users - however, I don’t know if people fully realize that the accuracy of online health information varies by source.

I don’t think we should simply be accepting the fact that the internet induces health anxiety. There are a handful of actions that can be taken, both on a large scale (changes in how search engines operate) and on a patient-physician scale (increased awareness of the phenomenon) that can ensure that there’s less unnecessary health anxiety fueled by the internet.

[axolotl]

SLA: I agree - the anxiety begins in us. However, I I want to clear up something that you’ve said - I think that there is more misinformation online than we think. Some websites (particularly government/organizational websites) have been shown to have much more accurate medical information than other websites (medical blogs/forums such as this one). That’s not to say that forums like this aren’t immensely helpful for users - however, I don’t know if people fully realize that the accuracy of online health information varies by source.

I don’t think we should simply be accepting the fact that the internet induces health anxiety. There are a handful of actions that can be taken, both on a large scale (changes in how search engines operate) and on a patient-physician scale (increased awareness of the phenomenon) that can ensure that there’s less unnecessary health anxiety fueled by the internet.

I think this is a wider issue of poor digital and information literacies, though, that is a factor in how people get misinformation about all topics. Look at the amount of fake news and "alternative facts" out there. A greater public understanding of the veracity of sources goes further than medical issues.

With a some exceptions, however, the majority of people I've chatted to on here are anxious through a misunderstanding of legitimate websites, filtered through a cherry-picking anxious mind, rather than getting scared by BS clickbait.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I think this is a wider issue of poor digital and information literacies, though, that is a factor in how people get misinformation about all topics. Look at the amount of fake news and "alternative facts" out there. A greater public understanding of the veracity of sources goes further than medical issues.

With a some exceptions, however, the majority of people I've chatted to on here are anxious through a misunderstanding of legitimate websites, filtered through a cherry-picking anxious mind, rather than getting scared by BS clickbait.

That's my observation too, it's more about the sufferer than the information.

Sources are one thing but it would be a sticking plaster to not apportion responsibility correctly here.

---------- Post added at 22:14 ---------- Previous post was at 22:12 ----------

SLA: I agree - the anxiety begins in us. However, I I want to clear up something that you’ve said - I think that there is more misinformation online than we think. Some websites (particularly government/organizational websites) have been shown to have much more accurate medical information than other websites (medical blogs/forums such as this one). That’s not to say that forums like this aren’t immensely helpful for users - however, I don’t know if people fully realize that the accuracy of online health information varies by source.

I don’t think we should simply be accepting the fact that the internet induces health anxiety. There are a handful of actions that can be taken, both on a large scale (changes in how search engines operate) and on a patient-physician scale (increased awareness of the phenomenon) that can ensure that there’s less unnecessary health anxiety fueled by the internet.

So, is this solely about existing sufferers being impacted by the Internet? Or a true disorder, which seems to be the indication of giving it a name? Reading your webpage suggests an additional disorder when really this should already be part of the existing disorder. And why is it only health? If it's about the Internet why does it not cover it the way I gave an example for?