Medicine and the Internet: Introducing Online Resources and Terminology
CMAJ 1997;156:696
Bruce C. McKenzie. 206 pp. Illust. Oxford University Press, Oxford, England; Oxford University Press Canada, Don Mills, Ont. 1996. $39.50. ISBN 0-19-262705-8
| Overall rating: |
Excellent |
| Strengths: |
Clear, concise and comprehensive; helps anyone get up and running on the Internet; contains plenty of guidance for use of the Internet in medical practice |
| Weaknesses: |
The World Wide Web could have been given a bigger proportion of the book |
| Audience: |
All physicians; targeted at computer neophytes |
This is an exceptional book. It stands head and shoulders above the crowd of poorly written books put out hurriedly to cash in on the recent interest in the Internet. Author Bruce McKenzie actually delivers what he advertises: a book that can bring a physician who knows little about computing and nothing about the Internet to the point of using the Internet as part of his or her everyday practice.
McKenzie assumes nothing about his readers. He starts from the basics of what type of computer to consider, through modems and Internet providers. If you do not know what these terms mean, you will before you are half-way through the book. If you do know, you will not be insulted by patronizing chapters, and you will still learn something.
You might expect a British book to be full of information on Internet sites and resources that are irrelevant to Canadian physicians. However, except for the Internet provider list, all of the sites mentioned can be reached from anywhere in the world. McKenzie does not overlook CMA Online or McMaster University's Cochrane Collaboration site.
The section on online ethics contains information I have never seen anywhere else. Besides the usual "netiquette" for email and newsgroups, it discusses how to cite an online source in a research paper. It also introduces some subjects that have to be addressed in the near future. These include confidentiality, the reliability of information on the Internet and the ethics of using references from Internet resources that may disappear. All of these topics have long worried me. McKenzie does not have any pat answers, but he asks the questions well.
The sections on older Internet services, such as Veronica, Archie and gopher, are lucid descriptions of these features and their use. However, today most users have a "net browser" and, in fact, think that the Internet is the World Wide Web (WWW). This part of the Internet will grow.
McKenzie spends more time than I would discussing CompuServe as an Internet service provider. After reading Medicine and the Internet, the user should be able to access the Internet through an independent service provider, which gives the user a lot more control and flexibility than online services such as CompuServe.
Any weaknesses in this book are trivial, balanced against how well the book fulfils its promise.
Bruce R. Evans, MD
Scarborough, Ont.
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