Treatment Options

If you have health issues or even life issues you will most likely benefit (and benefit others) through participation in dailystrength.org. This is social networking at its best. People form communities around health topics that interest them, answer questions for each other and share information about treatments. The treatments section is especially well done.

For example, at the Acne Support Group page you will find Top Treatments on the lower right side of the page. This is an unscientific - and I think extremely helpful - feature of the site. The top treatments are listed in order of how many people are using them. In the Acne Support Group, 213 members are using washing which makes it the most used. Each person then ranks how they think washing is working for them. Washing is deemed 70% effective by the 213 people in the Acne Support Group who say they use washing.

Notice, I'm using careful language here. As I mentioned before this is not a scientific study and it will not replace your doctor or other medical/health practitioner. I like it because it's an opportunity for people to compare notes on what they have tried and what has worked.

I also like the functionality of this feature. It's good database design with a good user interface.

DailyStrength

An outstanding idea with the execution to match - DailyStrength.org is a social networking site designed to support people with any health issue you can think of. It's free and anonymous.

Sign up is simple and the site is well designed. They have support groups already started for just about any disease or condition you can think of from allergies to women's health. If you don't find what you are looking for, however, you have two options. You can suggest a new support group or you can start a member group and invite others to it.

I just signed up today. I'll post more after I've used it a couple times.

Photoshare

Photoshare is an excellent photo sharing site for anyone in public health or health education. They have over 15,000 photographs in categories from "abortion" to "youth programs". There is no fee for non-commercial use. If you would like to add to their collection of documentary style photos, they will make sure you get the photo credit. There is also the Photoshare Blog which has acticles about interesting public health projects, their photo contest and points to interesting articles.

I found this via a non-web 2.0 source called AVERT.org which is the most comprehensive website on AIDS/HIV that I've ever seen.

Power to the People

I think I am now addicted to Rollyo. That's OK though, because I just created a customized search on alternative health. It's called Health and Wellness. I'll just type in "addiction" and I have all of the information I need to safely and effectively overcome my new life challenge.

These Rollyo searches are easy to edit too. If you know of a website I missed that should be included in this list, send me a note.