[medinformatics] Online STD Testing

[Medical Informatics News]

Public health officials have for years cautioned that the Internet was increasing the spread of
sexually transmitted diseases and associated risky behavior. Now those same officials are*using the medium to,
hopefully, slow STD incidence rates. Over and above the standard safe-sex messages, in some areas patients can*go
online and order selected lab tests, get results and even use specially designed electronic cards to notify
partners.


An article in American Medical News cites a website launched last summer by researchers at Johns Hopkins
University School of Medicine in Baltimore allowing women in Maryland to order
kits for at-home specimen collection. The kits could then be
mailed in and tested for gonorrhea and chlamydial infections. Results are available by telephone and those with
positive test results are referred to local public health clinics.


San Francisco’s Department of Health allows patients to order syphilis tests
and access results online. The department also hosts a Web site where patients can
use e-cards to notify partners that they may have been exposed to an STD.


Quoted in the article, Richard Rothenberg, MD, MPH, secretary-treasurer of the American Sexually Transmitted
Diseases Association said, “If people can find friends on the Internet, we should be able to find disease.”

ReadPermalink*|*Email this*|*Comments









Ads by Google



http://www.medicalinformaticsinsider...e-std-testing/