My startup is http://curenote.com. It's a social health site that allows people to ask and answer different health questions.<p>People can share what they did to cure them of an illness, share what their doctor told them or share certain symptoms they may experience. It's a great way of getting information form others before and after seeing the doctor.
<quote><p><i>I’m a 17 year old male, 140-150 pounds and 6 feet tall. Lately I’ve been experience pains and what appear to be some kind of mass in my RIGHT breast/nipple area. It hurts A LOT when I put pressure on it, or if I’m playing guitar and the body of the guitar presses against it. I’ve had an inverted nipple (I think that’s what it is?) as long as I can remember on my LEFT breast.</i><p><i>I’ve checked several websites on the internet and I’m not sure what to believe. I was wondering if someone could offer some advice before I go see a doctor?</i><p></quote><p>---<p>And the only right answer to this question is... right!... "go see a doctor." Blind leading a blind is rarely a good thing, and it is an especially bad idea when it is concerned with one's health.
I skimmed the front page of questions and answers, it looks more like "Yahoo Answers: Health" than "Mayo Clinic: Social". Trust is going to be a problem.<p>Also, this is essentially a StackExchange type site, and if you search their Area51 page for medicine and health, there seems to be minimal interest over there.
It is not great way to gather information about illnesses because when those people googling for information about illness go actually to meet the doctors they tend to know their illness better than the doctor when the doctor in reality knows it better than non-trained sick person. This is already happening in here and it's making the job of real doctors harder because they have to prove the patients information wrong.<p>Though yes this might create cheaper option for basic health care in the US where it is not already paid by taxes.