Leveraging Facebook Information Helped Doctors with Patient Diagnosis

Facebook may be the most incredible social situation in the history of the human race. It has brought together family, friends and even countries and cultures. One of the least expected benefits was the ability for this social media platform to be used to assist physicians to diagnose a patient.

A patient experienced a clogged artery in her neck. The ischemic stroke can be caused by trauma or by high blood pressure, diabetes or high cholesterol. The doctors noticed that the patient had drooping eyelids and one of her pupils was just a bit smaller than the other one. When her husband was questioned as to if this was a normal condition for the patient, he wasn’t sure. It was then, that they turned to the only more recent photographs available of the patient, which were on Facebook. Since the photos were only a few months old and the symptoms were not apparent in the pictures, the physicians diagnosed the problem as being traumatic.

Sources:
http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/08/24/facebook-helps-doctors-with-diagnosis/?hpt=he_c2

The information supplied in this article is not to be considered as medical advice and is for educational purposes only.