In the Official Google Blog yesterday, Adam Bosworth, CEO of Google, wrote at length about "How do you know you are getting the best care possible." He addresses several important questions and admits to some of the limitations of Google's current search results:

• How do I know if the information is trustworthy and reliable?
• Am I getting the best standard of care?
• Who is the best doctor or institution for you?

On the first point, he states, "we can do better at making this kind of labeling noticeable and your ideas on how we could make it clear to you that a site is medically reliable or trustworthy."
The best standard of care issue is his real passion - he notes that even finding guidelines for treating a specific condition is a challenge but is essential to good care.
Address the best doctor question, he admits that rating physicians is not the same a rating food, perhaps a reference to the growing number of provider rating sites.
His posting is a good summary of the limitations of the current status of internet health information. I would welcome Google's willingness to "do better" and help find solutions beyond the intial Google Coop effort.

Technorati: Google Health