Elgin Web site provides online medical info

Published in the Courier News 06/26/02

  Having three little kids, with one having just finished kindergarten and the second soon to start preschool, my family tends to have its share of viruses, sniffles and other maladies (to say nothing of the scrapes my klutziness gets us into).

  Fortunately for us, my wife is a registered nurse, though the boys and I tend to need her skills more often than we'd like.

  But every now and then we run into something that's out of her area of expertise, and we'll spend some time surfing one of several popular medical Web sites — WebMD, drkoop.com, etc.

  So I was interested the other day when I got an e-mail from a new site called elginareahealth.org.Elgin-area 'magazine'

  The e-mail highlighted articles on parenting tips, eating out, second-hand smoke and exercise. A visit to the site reveals categories such as Health Departments, with articles in areas such a chiropractic medicine, dermatology and pediatrics; Healthy Alternatives, with alternative medicine-related articles; Healthy Bytes and Healthy Scoop, with links to news articles on a variety of topics; and even a section with online surveys on medical topics (the current one asks how long, on average, you wait in a doctor's office).

  The site, launched at the end of May, is run by South Elgin Chiropractic Associates, and edited by its owners, Dr. Peter Rohrs and Dr. Timothy Moore. Rohrs said the two got the idea after listening to a presentation at a conference by Dr. Sigmund Miller, head of a New Jersey- and California-based company called Healthy Practices.

  "We wanted to help bring more health information to the public," said Rohrs.

  Healthy Practices is a 1 1/2-year-old company that produces what Miller calls online "health magazines" — sites that include articles or links to current articles on various health topics. The company puts together general health information and articles written by doctors from around the country and then helps create and maintain sites for local doctors who want to create a site custom to their local community. They also provide training and ongoing support.

  Miller said the company now has sites in 200 communities, with about 24,000 subscribers. They hope to have sites in 500 communities by the end of the year.

  While Healthy Practices provides the overall framework, the local editors choose the content for their own site, as well as possibly writing their own articles or recruiting other local health-care professionals to do so. In addition, each site includes a local community calendar where local civic groups can post their activities for publicity.

  Where sites like WebMD or drkoop provide reference information, Miller said, elginareahealth and its sister sites provide current, localized information. So, you would use WebMD like an encyclopedia and elginarehealth.org like, well, the Courier News.

  "We're able to customize the magazine, allowing the editors to reach locally to their own community," Miller said. "This is a local doctor providing information to their community."

  "This is geared toward people who want to improve their quality of life," Miller said. "We want to empower people to make decisions."

  "What I would like to see is that it increase awareness of the health-care services in our area," Rohrs said.

  If you sign up for a free subscription to elginareahealth.org, you'll receive monthly e-mail updates with new content or new links to articles on the site.

Tew Bits covers topics of interest to the average home computer user. To submit questions or ideas for future columns, write to this column at The Courier News, 300 Lake St., Elgin IL 60120. You also can fax to (847) 888-7836, e-mail jtew@scn1.com or visit the Tew Bits Web page at www.tewfamily.com/tewbits.html.

06/26/02