20 Useful Specialty Search Engines for Healthcare Workers

Depending upon specialty or line of work, healthcare workers can find a plethora of information on the Web that can point to resources for health care. You also may learn that more sites are blending Western and Eastern healing philosophies in an integrative approach that includes preventive care. The following 20 useful specialty search engines for healthcare workers includes search engines, directories and other search tools, all designed to provide professionals with the ultimate in research flexibility and successful results.

Each link is categorized alphabetically within three categories.

Search Engines

1. CE Search Engine: This is the ultimate healthcare continuing education search engine that lists thousands of providers for CE by profession. If you click on the “browse” link, you can find programs by state, by category, by discipline and by accreditor.
2. Hospital Compare: This search engine responds to location information by Zip Code or by city and state. You also can find the type of hospital you need. This site is maintained by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
3. SPOT Healthcare: This beta search engine offers professionals a chance to find content from thousands of industry-related Web sites. The site promises to deliver the most relevant search results.

Directories

4. American Hospital Directory: The AHD provides data and statistics about more than 6,000 hospitals nationwide. Hospital information includes both public and private sources such as Medicare claims data (MedPAR and OPPS), hospital cost reports, and other files obtained from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
5. Doctor Directory: Since 1996, this search engine has matched thousands of patients seeking medical services with the right healthcare professional. They also provide healthcare professionals the opportunity to participate in market research and other programs that help shape the healthcare industry.
6. Health Care Workers Lesson Plans: Find teacher reviewed health care worker ideas, from health care to health benefits lesson plans. These lessons plans are offered by Lesson Planet, a search engine for teachers.
7. Healthcyclopedia: This directory supplies over 7,500 health topics and health care resources available on the Internet by category or by A-Z health conditions. The site also supplies updated links to topics and to health and wellness “gurus” and organizations.
8. The Healing Directory: This website is about giving readers’ bodies the same attention they give their minds. By reducing our intake of toxins, exercising regularly, using food as medicine, and de-stressing with healing treatments, readers could be better equipped to nourish body, mind, and spirit. Ultimately, the authors hope readers will strike a balance of body-mind-spirit that will allow them to be more open to experiencing happiness, love, and serenity.
9. The Holistic Directory: This directory provides a concentrated source of specialist websites and practitioners in the field of human health and spiritual well being, as well as providing the information and the means for people to help themselves in self healing.
10. Virtual Hospital: The University of Iowa’s Hospitals and Clinics offer an A-Z health topic database. For two decades, faculty and staff from the University of Iowa’s Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine and UI Hospitals and Clinics have written the health care information that millions of Internet users have sought on the pages of this site and at Virtual Children’s Hospital.
11. World Directory of Medical Libraries: The WHO (World Health Organization) Library and Information Networks for Knowledge (LNK) is compiling a World Directory of Medical Libraries. This comprehensive listing of medical/health libraries worldwide will provide a unique resource to facilitate the flow of information between libraries and coordination of global efforts to improve access to health information.

Other Search Tools

12. Acupuncture.com: This gateway contains 3000+ pages filled with information about acupuncture, lifestyle and techniques. Find new and updated articles and research about acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine as well as vendors who supply books, music, video, herbs and medical supplies. This site also contains a referral directory.
13. Global Library of Women’s Medicine: This is a free resource designed to support the medical profession in their care of women and made possible by over 750 expert clinicians who are generously providing their contributions without any remuneration and by the publishers who have paid personally for the creation of this site in the memory of their daughter, Abigail. The principal features of the site consist of 442 specialist chapters plus surgical videos, diagnostic atlases, laboratory tests and a special section on Safer Motherhood.
14. HealthIndex: This site is a network of physicians and researchers with a goal to help promote world health by providing extensive information on prevention, wellness, and therapy to the world community by providing access to multiple biomedical databases and information representing all health models and paradigms worldwide. They maintain the MINTIS Database, ChirACCESS and information on various topics in integrative health care.
15. HealthlinkUSA: This site contains forums where individuals exchange information and ask specific questions to others about more than 700 health conditions, diseases and topics.
16. Hospitals Worldwide: This site contains a search engine, but it also is a directory and news and patient resource. The site contains over 15,000 entries of hospitals and health clinics throughout the world. Search by combination of country, alphabetical letter or keyword. Hospitals Worldwide is owned by MediLexicon International Ltd.
17. Medical Tourism Guide: Health-Tourism.com offers this free medical tourism guide and a directory of medical centers, bringing you detailed and useful information that will help you find the best healthcare services abroad. Over 300 medical centers and medical travel intermediaries from 25 countries are included in the directory.
18. Medpedia: The Medpedia Project is a long-term, worldwide project to evolve a new model for sharing and advancing knowledge about health, medicine and the body among medical professionals and the general public. As Medpedia grows over the next few years, it will become a repository of up-to-date unbiased medical information, contributed and maintained by health experts around the world, and freely available to everyone.
19. Memorial Sloan-Kettering Integrative Medicine: This section of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center site focuses on using Western and Eastern approaches and medications, including herbs, botanicals and other products for cancer remedies. The articles and searches reach across a wide market of patients, from children to adults.
20. Orphanet: This portal is focused on rare diseases and orphan drugs. Its aim is to contribute to the improvement of the diagnosis, care and treatment of patients with rare diseases. Orphanet includes a Professional Encyclopedia, which is expert-authored and peer-reviewed. This Directory includes information on relevant centers of expertise, clinical laboratories, research activities and patient organizations.