30-year-old IT professional undergoes cyberchondria treatment
(dna - Sudhir Shetty)
Doctors say he checks Google excessively for diseases and their symptoms.
Doctors say he checks Google excessively for diseases and their symptoms. Convinced that he suffers from many diseases
A 30-year-old IT professional is undergoing treatment at JJ hospital for what is called cyberchondria.
He is suffering from anxiety and depression since he checks Google excessively for diseases and their symptoms. He has even convinced himself that he suffers from a number of ailments.
"The patient had been suffering from minor gastric problems for a year. He either had constipation or loose motion. He consulted many gastroenterologists and got all tests done. Although all tests were normal, he felt that he had colon cancer," said Dr Sagar Mundada, psychiatrist at JJ.
He said that every time the patient had loose motion, he started looking up on the Internet for the rarest of rare diagnosis and assumed that he has got it.
"He confessed that over the last four months, there were times when he spent the entire day just reading possible diseases, based on the symptoms he had. This behaviour started showing its effect even on his social functioning," said Dr Mundada.
"Repetitive online search for symptoms and online search interfering with routine work are two symptoms of cyberchondria. You search for vague symptoms and believe that you have one of the many diseases that pops up, when you search and you fear that you have the most catastrophic disease that pops up. You start trusting Webmd and Google more than the doctor. Just reading about symptoms online makes you feel sick," said Dr Yusuf Matcheswalla, a psychiatrist attached with Masina hospital.
The man from south Mumbai was given behavioural psychotherapy. "After 4-5 sessions, he has started to accept the fact that perhaps there is nothing wrong with him," said Dr Mundada.
Dr Heena Merchant, secretary of the Bombay Psychiatric Society, said that cyberchondria is increasingly on the rise with the advent of technology.
"On the Internet, there are many health-related websites. Self- diagnosis by patients can affect doctor-patient communication adversely. Psychotherapy in such cases plays an important role," said Dr Merchant.
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