Google search expands its health conditions cards, adds a few other improvements

Back in February Google first introduced medical condition cards to Google search, giving you basic information on diseases and ailments as common as the cold or as rare as polio. Today Google is expanding on these cards by adding more detailed information, more health conditions that should total nearly 1000, an improved look, and the ability to download the information on cards as a PDF.

That last added function is the most crucial, as it means you can now search for illnesses and if you think those symptoms sound familiar to your situation, you can download them to show your healthcare provider.  Not sure if you trust where Google is getting its information? In an official blog post, Google highlights that it gets its facts from working closely with doctors and the Mayo Clinic to create these cards. That means the information being dispensed has been verified for accuracy.

Of course, in order to look up these cards you’d have to suspect you have a specific disease in the first place. A system where you input symptoms like running noise into search and get matched with potential fits would be a nice addition — then again, it would led to a lot of people over worrying about symptoms thinking they are connected to some larger ailment. For now, I’d wager the main purpose of these cards is to look up diseases that you have heard about (maybe you have a friend or family member that was recently diagnosed) as opposed to trying to ‘cure yourself’.

Anyhow, expect those changes to start rolling out soon. For even more details, be sure to check out Google’s official inside search blog post.