{"id":267138,"date":"2023-11-12T05:18:58","date_gmt":"2023-11-12T10:18:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/platohealth.ai\/weekly-reads-google-cirm-young-swedish-bone-marrow-the-niche\/"},"modified":"2023-11-12T09:02:44","modified_gmt":"2023-11-12T14:02:44","slug":"weekly-reads-google-cirm-young-swedish-bone-marrow-the-niche","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/platohealth.ai\/weekly-reads-google-cirm-young-swedish-bone-marrow-the-niche\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekly reads: Google, CIRM, young Swedish bone marrow – The Niche","gt_translate_keys":[{"key":"rendered","format":"text"}]},"content":{"rendered":"
For me, this was another week of heavy grant writing but also taking on Google again. How? Over how badly its search engine often performs on stem cell queries. I have a new piece at MedPage Today. It\u2019s focused on the problem of Google Search promoting unproven stem cell clinic websites.<\/p>\n Here it is. Why I \u2018Anti-Trust\u2019 Google Search on Healthcare<\/a>, MedPage Today<\/em>. <\/strong> It\u2019s kind of a mystery as to why, but Google seems to love the websites of many stem cell clinics. Do the clinics spend a ton on SEO? Have some other web magic?<\/p>\n However clinics do it, Google often ranks them higher than the websites of NIH, Mayo, and others that are clear experts. In almost 100% of cases, the clinics are not the experts. Can Google not tell the difference? Does it not care that these firms market unproven medical offerings? Does Google get something out of so highly ranking these clinic websites? I wish I had more answers.<\/p>\n As I\u2019ve written before here on The Niche<\/strong><\/a> and for STAT News<\/strong><\/a>, I met with Google a couple of years back and went over this issue with them. Perhaps it was naive of me to expect them to actually change anything. They know best, of course.<\/p>\n One other sad possibility is that Google ranks the clinic websites so highly because it somehow believes that people want easier access to risky, unproven medical interventions and promotional \u201cinformation\u201d that the clinics have on their sites.<\/p>\n Will Google change moving forward on stem cells? Probably not but the stakes are high so it\u2019s important to try to make a difference here. It seems patients are almost always recruited to clinics via the web and Google dominates.<\/p>\nGoogle still prefers stem cell clinic websites to NIH, Mayo, etc.<\/h2>\n