Google is launching a new feature that will help users have a better idea of any health issues that they might be having. The way it works is that users can now search for any symptoms instead of the condition. For instance, users can search for say, “My skin itches” and so on.
To this, Google will promptly show an overview of the potential conditions and ways of getting it treated. It will also apprise the user of how best to have more information on the same from the web and which doctors are best suited for treating such conditions.
Google has worked with eminent personalities from the medical fraternity while also categorizing information from its search database. Google stated they worked with doctors to review the information on symptoms that it shows while those from the Harvard Medical School and Mayo Clinic helped it match the symptoms with the medical conditions.
It’s like matching the symptoms from search results with all relevant information about it as found in its Knowledge Graph. It’s about 900 health conditions that Google has listed in its database.
“To get this information, we worked with a team of medical doctors to carefully review the individual symptom information and develop the way we build the related health conditions list,” a Google spokeswoman said. “We also had experts at Harvard Medical School and the Mayo Clinic evaluate related conditions for a representative set of searches to help improve the lists we show.”
It should also display the most relevant and targeted information each time a user searches for a given symptom. The user will also be saved from having to plough around the maze of sites that they now have to wade through to come to the right information. Not to mention, there is again no dearth of sites that often have misleading information that again lead to more anxiety for the user than they might already be going through.
However, the new feature is strictly mobile-only at the moment, available only via its mobile browser and its app for Android and iOS. Further, the feature is only accessible in the US and English language. The search giant said it would eventually be released all around the world in a phased manner.
