I only recently started posting on discussion boards for hair loss/tranplantation patient education and was immediately amazed at the broad spectrum of this audience. In the past 2 months I have had patients from all walks of life, from the building repair man to a prominent national legislator who have told me that they frequent these sites.
Sites like this offer an in-depth review by patients and doctors on a variety of topics. While everything one reads on the web is not true, it is pretty easy on these sites to pick out what is "way out there"; as the crowd tends to express its opinion fairly quickly and often loudly.
I applaud this and the other couple of quality sites for allowing these discussions, and expressions of patient experiences with different doctors. A consistent review of these sites shows obvious leaders in the field from postings and positive comments from patients, staff of other clinics, and moderators.
This should never substitute for a thorough consultation with a physician(s) but certainly gives more information that an infomerical.
