第1497期:Cyberchondriacs

How are you feeling today? I've got a few aches and pains, but nothing serious. However, when things become more critical, I would normally book myself an appointment with my GP – although by the time I get to see him, the problem will have probably gone away. That's because in the UK at least, we usually have to wait a few days before the doctor can fit us in, and then when we're at the surgery, we have a long wait.

你今天感觉如何？我有一些疼痛和疼痛，但不严重。然而，当事情变得更加危急时，我通常会为自己预约我的全科医生——尽管当我见到他时，问题可能已经消失了。那是因为至少在英国，我们通常要等几天才能让医生适应我们，然后当我们进行手术时，我们要等很长时间。

Luckily today, technology has come to our rescue. There are thousands of apps available on our smartphones that can offer first aid advice and allow us to self-diagnose our ailments – ranging from a simple cold or flu to some exotic disease such as dengue fever. And together with the internet, we have a whole encylopedia of medical information at our fingertips.

幸运的是，今天，技术已经拯救了我们。我们的智能手机上有数以千计的应用程序可以提供急救建议，让我们能够自我诊断我们的疾病——从简单的感冒或流感到登革热等一些外来疾病。与互联网一起，我们拥有一整套医疗信息百科全书。

But is this just what the doctor ordered? Is too much knowledge a good thing? By reading up on an illness, we discover its side-effects and what could happen in a worst-case situation. More worrying is that we give ourselves the wrong diagnosis, and then worry ourselves sick that we're going to die. This health anxiety, fuelled by the internet, is called cyberchondria. It gives sufferers a deep fear of diseases and, according to experts, it's on the rise. Professor Peter Tyrer from Imperial College London, told the BBC: "We find that approximately four out of five of our patients with health anxiety spend literally hours on the internet…. one of the first things we do in treatment is we tell them to stop browsing the internet."

但这正是医生所要求的吗？知识太多是好事吗？通过阅读疾病，我们发现了它的副作用以及在最坏的情况下会发生什么。更令人担忧的是，我们给自己错误的诊断，然后担心自己会死去。这种由互联网引发的健康焦虑被称为网络软骨症。它使患者对疾病产生了深深的恐惧，据专家称，这种恐惧正在上升。伦敦帝国理工学院的 Peter Tyrer 教授告诉 BBC：“我们发现，大约五分之四的患有健康焦虑症的患者在互联网上花费了数小时……我们在治疗中做的第一件事就是告诉他们停止浏览互联网。”

Of course there is no doubt, the world wide web has most of the information we need to diagnose our symptoms but Doctor Tyrer points out "it doesn't have any judgement associated with it." This is why having a consultation with a doctor face-to-face still has its benefits, although a study a few years ago found many GPs felt intimidated by the increasing numbers of web-wise patients arriving in surgeries. One doctor admitted to not being very happy about patients using the internet, saying: "They all seemed to come to me with things I'd never heard of and very often with things which seem rather bizarre or inappropriate."

当然，毫无疑问，万维网拥有我们诊断症状所需的大部分信息，但 Tyrer 医生指出“它没有任何与之相关的判断”。这就是为什么与医生面对面咨询仍然有其好处的原因，尽管几年前的一项研究发现，许多全科医生对越来越多的网络患者接受手术感到害怕。一位医生承认对使用互联网的患者不太满意，他说：“他们似乎都带着我从未听说过的东西来找我，而且经常带着看起来很奇怪或不合适的东西来找我。”

But Professor Sue Ziebland, from Oxford University, has spent 15 years examining how patients use the internet – including people with cancer. She found that doctors now routinely discuss it as a resource with patients during consultations so it becomes an everyday part of medical conversation. It would seem then that a virtual online doctor can prescribe a dose of useful advice, but technology hasn't replaced the human medical expert just yet.

但牛津大学的 Sue Ziebland 教授花了 15 年时间研究患者如何使用互联网——包括癌症患者。她发现医生现在经常在咨询期间与患者讨论它作为一种资源，因此它成为医疗对话的日常部分。看起来，虚拟在线医生可以开出一些有用的建议，但技术还没有取代人类医学专家。

词汇表

critical 严重的，危险的
appointment 预约
GP 全科医生
surgery 诊所
come to someone’s rescue 帮助某人脱离窘境
self-diagnose 自诊
ailment 小病
dengue fever 登革热
at our fingertips 近在我们手边
just what the doctor ordered 正是想要的东西，正是所需之物
side-effect 副作用
worst-case 最坏的可能
anxiety 焦虑，不安
cyberchondria 网络臆想病
fear 恐惧
treatment 医治
symptom 症状
consultation 问诊
intimidate 恐吓
bizarre 奇怪的，异乎寻常的
prescribe 开（药）
dose 剂量