Cyberchondria is a new term that is related to hypochondria. People who are hypochondriac often think they are ill but they really don’t have any illness except for the psychological kind.
Cyberchondriac people are those who would search online for medical information. Usually, hypochondriac people are also cyberchondriac as they would immediately search on the internet for the symptoms that they feel and they’d get amazing results of the possible conditions that they may be having.
Doctors think it is unhealthy for the medical information to be available online as it will only make the hypochondriac to always be more concerned about their health even though they are actually quite healthy. A very normal symptom may get really horrifying results on the internet as it can also be a symptom for several illnesses.
Cyberchondria is really unhealthy.
Usually people who suffer from this thinks they need to take expensive medical tests to check for the illnesses that they think they have simply because they found it online. It also makes them more stressed and therefore they get to feel even sicker. The more you think you are sick the more that you will get sick because of high stress level.
Browsing the internet for illnesses is really not bad. In fact, many with rare diseases find treatments that they never heard of and it actually worked for them. As long as you know how to control and ask your physician for opinions then medical info on the internet is really beneficial.
Author: Lucy Walker
Lucy Walker is a journalist, author and health living enthusiast who has been involved with health writing since 2014.
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I think that hypochondriacs are a nightmare and I also think that sometimes I am a bit of that… 🙂
I’ve never seen any evidence to suggest that they can really cause health problems, or that the body even produces toxins that it can’t deal with through the normal elimination and digestive process.If I had thought processes like that I’d still be suffering from IBS. I had it for six years, it started with food poisoning, which resulted in numerous hospital and doctor visits during a trip to Europe, with many explosive trips to the bathroom.>or that the body even produces toxins that it can’t deal with through the normal elimination and digestive process. Exactly! And your whole site, 15 years of life is about your body not having a normal elimination and digestive process. And these so-called toxins’ are very vague and unscientific as well, and are used to explain all kinds of symptoms, but again I’ve never seen any evidence to suggest that they can really cause health problemsThat’s closed minded and ignorant. Why are you so closed minded? A person with an open mind would look at all alternatives and consider them based on the evidence. There are THOUSANDS of testimonials of people healing IBS and other problems, they can’t all be wrong or made up. Realize I’m just trying to help. This is coming from someone who’s been there. I’m 28 as well, and had I listened to the 6 quacks we call MD’s here I’d still have IBS. What have you got to lose? Why not listen to someone who’s been there and beat it instead of defining your life around a problem which many people have beat? Sincerely, chris, vancouver, bc