Google is my doctor

Scott Adams (Dilbert) blogs Google is my Doctor:

About a year ago I started using Google Alerts to tell me whenever someone mentioned Dilbert, me, or anything about Spasmodic Dysphonia on the Internet.  About six months ago I got an alert with a link to an obscure medical publication with a report about an even more obscure surgical procedure for fixing spasmodic dysphonia.  I took that information to my doctor, who referred me to an expert at Stanford University, who referred me to an expert surgeon at UCLA.  Long story short, the operation I read about wasn't as promising as the article suggested, but the final surgeon in my travels had his own version of surgery that had a good track record.  I tried it, and now my voice is normal.  I never would have found that path without Google Alerts.

This is not an isolated story. Increasingly people are taking their medical care into their own hands, and using Google and other online tools to find information and make contacts. A major trend in health care.