I haven’t met David Rothman (the kvetcher) but I’m pleased that his “I’m baffled” post is clearly open to dialog. I’ll go suggest that he read my comment this morning on e-patients.net, which I provides my real-world examples of the principles laid out in the e-patient white paper.

I’m in the process of drafting some e-patient rights and responsibilities, and one of them includes the phrase “If you encounter someone who’s new to this, share, don’t clobber.”

It is what it is, and we should react by innovating. I’m pretty confident that more health professionals will interact and that the gap will be bridged. It’s what our patients want.

Thanks Gilles for bearing witness to what’s happening,

Ted

Just follow carefully what more than 50,000 cancer patients and their caregivers discuss daily on the various ACOR lists. They communicate about what is important for them. They have the responsibility to maximize the quality of care they receive and they all know (don’t we all know that simple fact) that health professionals just cannot do it alone any longer. The millions of Americans who communicate with their peers about shared medical conditions are ardent users of the knowledge of crowds and beneficiaries of the effects of participatory medicine. But so far they leave in a parallel word where very few health professionals have dared to interact. I hope this will change fast. There is much to gain in helping bridge these 2 parallel universes.