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In the age of “Dr. Google,” it can be tempting to click your way to self-diagnosis — but an overload of health information can cause its own set of symptoms.
“Cyberchondria,” a subset of health anxiety, is described as a condition in which an individual excessively searches for health information online.
While cyberchrondria may not start as a physical disease, it can cause intense levels of anxiety and fear that can negatively impact a person’s health, according to Dr. Maggie Williams, a family physician in Scottsdale, Arizona, and medical director for MDLIVE Virtual Primary Care.
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Dr. Marc Siegel, clinical professor of medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center and a Fox News medical contributor, said he and his colleagues used to call the condition “medical students’ disease.”
An overload of health information can cause its own set of symptoms called “cyberchondria,” or heightened health anxiety. (iStock)
“When you know a little, but not enough, you imagine you have everything and constantly worry,” he told Fox News Digital.
Although cyberchondria is not listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) as a formal diagnosis, it’s thought to be closely related to hypochrondria, a more general heightened anxiety about one’s health.
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In 2014, two U.K. researchers, Eoin McElroy and Mark Shevlin, created a “cyberchrondria severity scale” that measures a person’s score across eight areas: compulsion, distress, excessiveness, reassurance seeking and mistrust of medical professionals.
Growing prevalence of cyberchrondria
As Siegel pointed out, the condition is becoming more common over time.
“The invention of the internet and then the perfection of search engines created a global hypochondria, where patients searched to find possible explanations for their symptoms,” he said.
“The invention of the internet and then the perfection of search engines created a global hypochondria, where patients searched to find possible explanations for their symptoms,” a doctor told Fox News Digital. (iStock)
“It especially increased during the pandemic, when dogma abounded and everyone was suddenly an expert,” Siegel added.
A study published in JIMR Formative Research last year found that COVID-19 caused a spike in the condition in spring 2020, as people experienced higher levels of “cyberchondria-related distress and compulsion during the pandemic.”
“The invention of the internet and then the perfection of search engines created a global hypochondria, where patients searched to find possible explanations for their symptoms.”
One user shared experiences with cyberchrondria on Reddit: “I thought that I might see something that will ease my mind, but … it makes it all worse and worse. Out of the 100 times I checked a symptom online, only 10 of them kinda made me feel safe.”
Another user wrote,