"Hypochondriac's dream"

The Oregonian reports:
A new site, whoissick.org, hopes to become a grass-roots database, of sorts, for what ails you. You log on, plug in your ZIP code and your symptoms. Chills? Check. Stomach ache? Check. Fever? Better check that, too.

The site records your symptoms and lets you know who else is under the weather in your ZIP code. We plugged in 97201 -- downtown Portland -- and found 131 people feel lousy.

Nifty idea, but is it effective?

We asked Dr. Mel Kohn, Oregon's epidemiologist, to take a look at whoissick.org. He thought it was interesting but flawed.

For starters, it's hard to interpret the symptoms when people are self-reporting. What do the symptoms mean? Is the cough a cold or the start of something more serious? Is it a low-grade fever that came and went or is it higher than 101 degrees and has it gone one for more than a day?

"The way they are listed on that Web site, your fever might be different from my fever so it's a little hard to interpret," Kohn said.

Besides, who's reporting their illnesses? Kohn said it's likely that more people in their 20s are visiting the site to log their symptoms compared with people in their 60s.

He said it correlating the info on whoissick.org with hospital visits or visits to primary care doctors. But taken alone, the data on whoissick.org isn't too helpful, he said.

"I think it's interesting but I am skeptical about what the value is," Kohn said.