PubMed Health Provides Disease and Treatment Information for Consumers

PubMed Health Provides Disease and Treatment Information for Consumers

From the PubMed Health About Page

PubMed Health is a consumer health Web site produced by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), a division of the National Library of Medicine (NLM) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). PubMed Health provides up-to-date information on diseases, conditions, injuries, drugs, supplements, treatment options, and healthy living, with a special focus on comparative effectiveness research from institutions around the world.

PubMed Health includes:

• consumer guides summarizing comparative effectiveness research
• fact sheets on diseases and conditions
• information on drugs and supplements
• encyclopedic overviews of health topics
• links to external Web sites

PubMed Health has a special focus on comparative effectiveness research, in particular that research which evaluates the available evidence of the benefits and harms of different treatment options for different groups of people. In Comparative Effectiveness Research, experts often synthesize the evidence from dozens, or even hundreds, of individual studies.

One can search PubMed Health

• by keyword, as teeth, heart disease, Flomax, and CAT scan

When one enters a keyword, a list of topics suggested topics will appear underneath the word being typed.
For example, when typing CAT, phrases as Age Related Cataract, CAT scan, CAT scan arm, and cat scratch fever will              appear
Any of the suggested phrases can be clicked on for further searching

After a keyword is selected, there may be a few results or over 100 to choose.
Narrow the results by refining the search through the topics at the top of the page.

• by  the Topics (A-Z) section
  This listing includes redirections to the topic headings used by PubMed Health.
  For example, if one clicks on Y, the entries will include
  Yellow skin and eyes (see Jaundice – yellow skin)
  Yellow jacket sting (see Insect bites and stings)
• by Subject
  • Comparative Effectiveness
  • Diseases and Conditions
  • Drugs and Supplements
  • First Aid and Emergencies
  • Healthy Living
  • Tests and Treatments

PubMed Health does not replace MedlinePlus.(Click here for a related news item for the medical librarian community)

However, at this time there is some overlap with MedlinePlus. The disease, first aid, healthy living, tests/treatments,and  drug topics are identical, drawing from the same resources.  However the comparative effectivenes is unique to PubMed Health. MedlinePlus has additional resources including: health news, directories (finding doctors, hospitals,etc), and  organizations publishing health information. MedlinePlus has more ways to search incuding videos, easy-to-read, and multiple languages.

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• What Is Comparative Effectiveness Research? (jflahiff.wordpress.com)