The Havoc of "How-To" Health

By Kathy Summers 

    
Millions of people seem to have a voracious appetite for health tips, but they aren't always critical readers and most don't have a medical background to help them make accurate evaluations. Still, they may start new diets, change exercise routines, start or stop taking certain drugs, modify childcare practices, and seek or avoid certain forms of care based on nothing more than magazine medical advice. While some writers offer up health tips as casually as cocktail peanuts, others believe the Hippocratic Oath to "first do no harm" should apply to more than doctors. To identify the health writers worth emulating you'll have to look deeper into their stories, but here's their MO:

1. They avoid the pressure to sensationalize a story. We've all seen stories that fall into what a recent editorial in the Chicago Tribune called the "binge-and-purge school of medical reporting." Advances in science get sensationalized coverage followed by easily missed retractions. While readers are left with the impression of great new advances, nothing substantial has really happened. Some important stories aren't that sensational.  Savvy writers find other ways to make their stories interesting. 

2. They double-check facts and quotes with expert sources. Not just to protect themselves and their sources, but to protect readers from being exposed to flawed information and false interpretations. They don't let someone else dictate what they write, but what they write is better informed because they confirm it with the experts. Attribution in health stories is essential.  It's the only defense when direct knowledge is lacking.

3. They get second opinions. It takes a fair amount of skepticism to deal effectively with some of today's health claims in media releases and orchestrated briefings. Some "expert" somewhere will give any quote you want. But conscientious writers have a way of culling outlandish claims and assimilating conflicting opinions. They ignore obvious quacks, but if two expert sources of merit disagree, they include both sides. 

4. They honor the complexity of statistics. Interpreting the finer points of test results is never easy. Sloppy writers avoid the issue by generalizing. We can't always tell if a study is well designed, has flaws or is statistically sound. Rather than guess or generalize, the writers we trust run difficult numbers by a statistician or research scientist to decipher.

5. They read everything available on their topic. Look over the shoulders of conscientious writers and you'll find a home library of resources at their fingertips.

These are the habits of health writers worthy of our admiration. Not because they know it all, or never bought a false claim or had one they doubted turn out to be true, but because they have an ethical sense. They respect the limitations, qualifications and conditions inherent in their specialty. They give readers a fighting chance. And best of all, they show us what's possible in our specialty.  
`````
Available for reprint.