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Senior Citizen Health & Medicine
Senior Citizens Get New Online Help on How to
Communicate with Their Doctor
National Institutes of Health adds subject to Website
for seniors
Aug. 10, 2007 Effective communications between
senior citizens and their doctor is receiving increased attention, with
a growing number of studies showing there is a dangerous communications
gap and that many seniors fail to understand health care instructions.
In response, the National Institutes of Health have added a new subject
to their Website for senior citizens How to Talk with Your Doctor.
How do you talk about a sensitive subject with your
doctor? What if you forget to ask an important question? What if you
feel rushed during your visit? How can you get the most out of your
visit with your health care provider?
Being able to communicate openly, comfortably and
assertively with your doctor can help you make good health decisions and
stay well. But some older people shy away from this approach and
hesitate to ask questions or take the doctors time.
The best patient-doctor relationships are more of a
partnership, with both sides taking responsibility for good
communication. To guide older patients in speaking with their doctors,
the National Institutes of Health (NIH) offers Talking with Your Doctor,
a newly released topic on NIHSeniorHealth.gov, a Web site developed by
NIH with the needs of older people in mind.
The NIHSeniorHealth.gov Web site is a joint effort
of the National Institute on Aging (NIA) and the National Library of
Medicine (NLM), which are components of the NIH.
Most people know that communicating with their
doctor is important to their health care, especially as they age and are
more likely to have health conditions and treatments to discuss, says
Judith A. Salerno, M.D., NIA deputy director.
The key is to know how to have that conversation.
Older adults can turn to this newest feature on the
NIHSeniorHealth Web site for information on managing conversations with
their doctor. How to prepare for a doctor visit, what to ask, what
information to provide, and how to understand what the doctor says are
among the many helpful tips older adults can find on the site.
One of the fastest growing age groups using the
Internet, older Americans increasingly turn to the World Wide Web for
health information. In fact, 68 percent of wired seniors surf for health
and medical information when they go online.
NIHSeniorHealth.gov is based on the latest research on cognition and
aging. It features short, easy-to-read segments of information that can
be accessed in a variety of formats, including various large-print type
sizes, open-captioned videos and an audio version.
The site also links to MedlinePlus (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/),
the National Library of Medicines premier, more detailed site for
consumer health information.
NIA leads the federal effort supporting and
conducting research on aging and the health and well-being of older
people. NLM, the world's largest library of the health sciences, creates
and sponsors Web-based health information resources for the public and
professionals.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) The
Nation's Medical Research Agency includes 27 Institutes and Centers
and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic,
clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the
causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For
more information about NIH and its programs, visit
www.nih.gov.
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