PPO offering online answers to members' medical queries

Some question whether it's a good idea for First Health's medical directors to offer advice to patients they've never seen.

By Tyler Chin, AMNews staff. Sept. 8, 2003.

First Health this month is launching a service allowing members of the Downers Grove, Ill.-based PPO to have their medical questions answered by its medical directors via electronic mail.

Although some health plans reimburse physicians for online consultations with their patients, and even more plans offer health information online to members, First Health is among the first to allow members to communicate online with its medical directors, some observers believe.

The online service, which is free to patients and called the First Health Medical Director Q & A, also is unusual in that the doctors will field and answer questions from people they have never seen.

Such a relationship, however, isn't necessary because First Health isn't diagnosing or treating members online, said Scott Smith, MD, the PPO's chief medical officer. The service is designed strictly to offer patients health information that is personalized yet general in nature, he said.

For example, if a patient asks whether she should have a C-section, the PPO would respond by saying, "Well, this is the information you may want to look up about C-sections. This is why they are done, this is what it is, these are the possible complications,' and leave it at that," Dr. Smith said.

It also would advise them to discuss the matter with their physician. "Our doctors really have no motivation in all of this except to provide information," Dr. Smith said.