By Barbara Feder Ostrov
When was the last time you looked at the health page of your newspaper’s Web site?
You might be surprised by what you find. As the medical writer for the San Jose Mercury News, I’m aware that some unseen hand posts my stories online. I work with photographers on multimedia presentations and slide shows, mostly by trying to stay out of their way. I check the comments that occasionally accompany my stories for juicy tips. That’s about it.
So I was a bit taken aback to see all the new bells and whistles on my paper’s science and health page.
AHCJ HEALTH LINKSAHCJ has compiled links to more than 80 newspaper and magazine health Web sites. |
There is an AP Video report on a new breast cancer test that uses hair strands. San Jose’s former emergency services director is answering questions on pandemic and earthquake preparedness, something she’s been doing on our site for months.
A list of flu shot clinics, posted in the fall, tells readers where to go for immunizations. Perhaps most startling is a lengthy “public access journalism” series on drug addiction, sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson foundation.
Who knew?
Newspaper health sites run the gamut from a simple listing of stories published in the print version of the paper to The New York Times‘ health Web pages – that’s with an “s” – for health-care policy, fitness and nutrition, and mental health and behavior. The Times‘ Web pages include podcasts with reporters and an impressive health topic search engine that creates a new Web page with Times articles about the topic, say diabetes, that you’re interested in.
We can’t all be The New York Times, of course. But other local and big city newspaper health Web sites, are presenting information to readers in pretty innovative ways.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel divides its health offerings on two sites, one for the business of health care and the other for consumer health and fitness. The business page is rather dry, offering only a laundry list of stories published in the print version, but the consumer health and fitness page is more creative, with Q and A’s with local doctors and an “Off the Couch” blog where writer Tom Held informed me that mountain biking would be next to impossible during the holidays because harsh weather had made the trails too wet for safety. Good to know.
At the Los Angeles Times‘ health Web pages, readers can post questions for the newspaper’s health writers and see the answers online. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution offers a search engine to look up drug information, although I’d rather see the newspaper tell readers where the information
comes from. As it turns out, it’s from a health information vendor (www.adam.com). The AJC also entices readers with a body mass index calculator and a listing of what common medical procedures in the area cost.
The Miami Herald‘s health site asks readers to write in with their tales of health-care fraud, providing dozens of tips for reporter John Dorschner, who has covered the topic extensively.
As newspapers look to compete for online advertising, more news organizations are pressing forward with new features for their health pages. Some are working with health journalists. Most are not. Still, it behooves health reporters to at least be familiar with their publication’s related sites. It wouldn’t hurt to get to know the producers responsible for the health pages, either.
In many newsrooms, mine included, there’s little contact between Web folks and the reporters and editors whose work is showcased online. Mike Bazeley, a veteran reporter who now is senior Web editor for the San Jose Mercury News, said he would like that to change.
“There definitely should be some common ground between whoever’s managing the page and the science and health editors so newsroom people have more sense of ownership over these pages,” Bazeley said.
“It’s just a matter of who’s going to step up. We all, theoretically, are working toward the same end.”
Julie Deardorff, health and fitness columnist for The Chicago Tribune, has stepped up more than most. She not only knows the Web folks who post her work, she writes a health blog for the site and has appeared in online videos discussing new medical research. Writing primarily for published-in-advance feature sections, Deardorff thought the blog would be a good way to quickly communicate medical news to her readers and to engage them in a kind of conversation. Her interest in starting the blog dovetailed nicely with her publication’s goal to not simply repeat online what appears in print.
“I love the instant response,” Deardorff said, noting that before she went on maternity leave in December, she posted blog items at least three times a week. “It’s critical that print reporters are Internet savvy. Basically, I wanted to get into the Internet world.”
Deardorff admits that the blog and videos have cut into the time she spends writing for print, but says the online back and forth with readers has informed her weekly columns.
“They just keep adding these opportunities and you want to take them,” she said.
The impact of her online work hit home when a Northwestern University undergraduate asked to interview her about her job. When they met at a coffeehouse, Deardorff mentioned her print column.
The student looked confused. “Oh, no,” the student said. “I just saw your blog.”
“I thought that was really telling. She didn’t know anything about my work in print,” Deardorff said. “And she was a journalism major.”
Barbara Feder Ostrov has covered health care and medicine for the San Jose Mercury News since 2000. This article appeared in the Winter 2007 issue of HealthBeat.
