Recommendations For Health Care Professional Use Of Internet Search Engines To Locate Personal Information On Consumers

Most physicians believe that “Googling” patients represents a violation of trust and an invasion of patient privacy; however, 10 situations exist in which it may be ethically valid to use online search tools to learn more about a patient. These situations were named by researchers in a recent article published by the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Guidelines for appropriate physician use of the Internet and social media developed by the American Medical Association and the Federation of State Medical Boards do not specifically address whether physicians should use Internet search engines, such as Google, to learn more about patients . . .