The Inside Dope on the New Google Health Service

Drug Interactions

Once you have entered the names of any drugs you are taking or have imported prescription information from a linked pharmacy, Google Health will scout for potentially dangerous drug interactions and alert you by placing either a hexagon or a triangle with an exclamation point beside the Drug interactions link in the left menu. The service will also alert you to any notices from your linked service providers.

Find Your Doctors

You can add your family practitioner, surgeons, or other doctors you visit to your profile by clicking--what else?--Find a doctor in the left menu. Choose a type of practice from the drop-down list, type your doctor's name in the search field, and click the Search button. When you locate the doctor you're looking for, click Save to medical contacts to add that person to your profile.

Add Emergency Contacts

To round out your profile, add an emergency contact by clicking Medical Contacts and choosing Create a contact from the next screen. Enter your spouse, parents, or any other person you'd like a physician or hospital to notify in the event of an emergency, and include as many detailed notes as possible about the persons to be contacted, to help your health care provider communicate with them.

Print It Out

Once you've entered all of the relevant data into Google Health, all that remains is to keep it updated and to choose Print from the upper-right corner of the screen whenever you want to print out a fresh copy for your health care provider, family members, or anyone else you'd like to entrust with your data.