INTERNET AS A TOOL FOR HEALTH EDUCATION OF MEDICAL PERSONNEL

Medical services are knowledge-intensive activities. Therefore, the process of education of medical personnel (people who provide medical services professionally) is very important. This includes educational activities in preparation for a specific profession, but the lifelong learning process of physicians who are already working already is very important too. Ongoing education of medical personnel, based on accurate, reliable and the most current medical knowledge sources, guarantees the prime quality of medical services. The Internet has become a source of health information accessible to all users - potential patients, but also professional medical personnel. Doctors and other healthcare professionals (nurses, midwives, paramedics, physiotherapists) are increasingly browsing the Internet for information needed to do their work. It is necessary to verify the quality of information sources because of a huge number of websites that can provide health information.

The purpose of the paper is to discuss the review of the most reliable Polish medical portals designed for doctors and other medical personnel. The reasons for the existence of such portals as well as the advantages to be gained using them were determined. The results confirm the assumed working hypothesis about big role of Internet as the source of medical information for wide range of customers in the form of e-patients as well as for qualified medical personnel.