THE GOODS : Is There a Cyber Doctor in the House?
ACD-ROM is no substitute for a medical doctor, but then again, when was the last time your doctor made a house call?
Several medical-advice CD-ROMs are now available for home computers, the most prominent being the “Mayo Clinic Family Health Book.”
Adapted from a 1990 book with the same title, this CD-ROM contains information on more than 1,000 diseases and disorders, and it includes 500 color photographs, 45 animation clips and about 90 minutes of narration and other sounds.
The pictures and little cartoons are all very educational, but when you’re sick and looking for some medical tips, you probably don’t want to view animation sequences on gastrointestinal endoscopy.
No, you’re looking for relief, so let’s see what this CD-ROM has to say about a few common ailments. And for comparison’s sake, we’ll look up those same ailments on a competing CD-ROM, “The Doctors Book of Home Remedies,” by the editors of Prevention magazine, a publication that leans toward natural remedies.
* Athlete’s foot: The “Mayo” disc includes a graphic, full-color photograph that could probably be used to cure anyone who has a foot fetish.
This unpleasant condition, directly related to jock itch (yes, the “Mayo” disc has a picture of that, too), is caused by a fungus and results in nasty itching, stinging, burning, cracking and peeling of skin on the feet.
The “Mayo” CD-ROM dismisses as unproven the long-held belief that wearing sandals in public shower areas can help prevent athlete’s foot. It suggests instead the wearing of natural-fiber socks that absorb moisture and making sure that feet are dry after bathing or swimming. If you do get athlete’s foot, it advises the use of over-the-counter anti-fungal powders and creams.
The Prevention docs advise covering up in areas where people go barefoot. They suggest the use of the anti-fungals for the afflicted, but they also list some folk remedies, including soaking your feet in a wine-herb mixture.
* Headaches: For the common, occasional tension headache, the “Mayo” disc suggests moderate use of over-the-counter analgesics.
The Prevention CD-ROM also says that occasionally popping an aspirin is OK, but it goes on to list about 30 other--often contradictory--ways to get relief, including hot showers, cold compresses, sleeping it off, avoiding naps, exercise, the avoidance of exercise, biofeedback and Vitamin C (which shows up a lot on this CD-ROM).
* Warts: Of course, the “Mayo” disc just has to show them to us. It also includes the news that warts are harmless and many “disappear by themselves within two years.” If you don’t want your hands to look like the “Mayo” picture for that long, you can opt for getting a doctor to remove warts through electrical burning, freezing or laser surgery, or you can take your chances with one of several over-the-counter remedies.
The Prevention program warns that techniques used by doctors to get rid of warts “may or may not be effective. Many of them are painful and may leave scars. To add insult to injury, warts often reappear . . . .”
It lists 26 alternatives, one of which is letting warts disappear on their own. Then there is the ubiquitous Vitamin C, castor oil, a prescription patch that applies an acid directly onto the wart, and even hypnosis.
The final diagnosis: Medical advice CD-ROMs are nifty items, but probably won’t provide any more insight into an ailment than one of several books now on the market. Also, the content of these CD-ROMs is especially text heavy, and I find that prolonged reading of the text on a computer screen gives me a headache.
The “Mayo Clinic Family Health Book” is distributed by IVI Publishing and is available for about $45. “The Doctors Book of Home Remedies” is from Compton’s NewMedia and sells for about $40. Both discs are available on Macintosh and Windows platforms. A new version of “The Doctors Book of Home Remedies” will be available later this year.
