Taking Health Notes

I'm playing with Google Health, which I had never much gotten around to looking at even though I signed up for it right away (because Google owns everything else in my life, why not this too?).

It's pretty easy, and moderately easy to conceive of as useful.

I put in my Raynaud's phenomenon and my Chickenpox (links to the site's suggested "more info"). Easy as pie.

And those are just two of the hundreds of conditions available! For everyone, I mean, not that I personally need to add hundreds more conditions to get my record up to date.

You can also enter your own text if you want to keep track of a condition that isn't on their list. I like that option--it's nice to be able to add freeform information as well as picking from a list, since it gives you more control over the record as a whole.

Importing information from a provider worked like a charm as well. Makes me wonder if I could still access (and import) my information from my last insurance plan, which used online records.

The main thing that's bugging me right now is the lack of fuzzy dates. If you want to add details for a condition or medication, you have to pick a precise beginning and/or end date if you want to include one at all. And you know what? I really don't remember the precise dates on which I had Chickenpox.

It was well over 20 years ago. I wasn't paying attention at the time, OK? I was probably feverish and cranky. I could ask my mom, but I'm too busy whining. Besides, what if she doesn't remember either? Can't you just let me fuzzily select "Winter 1982" or something?

But no, I have to say "December 1, 1982" or some such exact date, and this unwarranted precision offends my well-developed sense of wanting things to be accurate. I can include a note stating that the date is approximate, which is better than nothing, but it's not completely satisfactory to me.

But overall, I can see that if Google Health continues to operate reliably and to effectively safeguard personal health information, it could be useful to come back to the site over the years to review this history.

For example, if I actually did know the precise dates of my Chickenpox infection, I could check that against historical news reports of outbreaks in the area at the time and gain a fuller understanding of how my own health fit into the larger health portrait of the region!

Or, you know, I could check the date of my last tetanus booster to see if I needed another one, or whatever.

We can generally assume our doctors will tend to have this information on file, but if we move and change doctors (as one often does, in the course of leading an eventful life that goes past the age of eight), stuff could get lost along the way. Especially from Chickenpox infections back in the last century.

Plus, it can be nice to have this sort of thing in one place for yourself.