Chapter 39   MEDICAL AND LEGAL INTERNET SITES AND RESEARCH

INTERNET ADDRESSES GENERALLY........... 39:2

Some Popular Search Engines 39:3

MEDICAL INFORMATION WEBSITES.............. 39:4

Physician Information.............. 39:5

Medicare........ 39:5

Patient and Consumer Information.............. 39:5

Medical Trade Associations.............. 39:6

Alternative Medicine 39:7

HEALTH LAW WEBSITES.............. 39:8

Health Website Search Engines and Jumpsites 39:8

Government Health Statistics............ 39:10

LAW RELATED WEBSITES............ 39:11

Law Search Websites............ 39:11

Nevada Law Websites............ 39:12

Other Important Nevada Websites............ 39:12

Nevada Local Government Websites............ 39:13

FEDERAL LAW WEBSITES............ 39:14

Congress...... 39:14

Executive Branch............ 39:15

United States Statutes and Regulations............ 39:16

United States Government Sites... 39:16

UNITED STATES COURTS............ 39:19

U.S. Court Rules............ 39:19

U.S. Supreme Court.. 39:19

U.S. Courts of Appeal 39:19

U.S. District Courts 39:20

U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Nevada 39:20

Court Administration and Bar Associations............ 39:20

LAW SCHOOLS AND LAW LIBRARIES............ 39:23

LEGAL FORMS AND DO-IT-YOURSELF SOURCES............ 39:23

HOW TO FIND PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET............ 39:24

The Internet is composed of several “domains,” the most well-known of which is the World Wide Web (www).  The Web is attractive because of its ability to deliver graphics, sound, and video.  Other “domains” of the Internet--gopher, telnet and e-mail, etc.--contain only text.

To use the Internet, a subscriber connects a (home) computer to an Internet Service Provider’s (ISP) computer by a modem.  A modem may use a regular telephone line to dial into the ISP’s computer which, in turn, connects the subscriber’s modem, via high speed fiber optic cable, to the Internet.  High speed telephone line connections (DSL) to the Internet are now available in Las Vegas and Reno.  This connection does not require an additional telephone line, can be used simultaneously while talking on the phone, and is as fast or faster than the usual cable modem connections.  Call your local telephone service to inquire about the availability and cost of a DSL connection in your area.  Cable modem connections are also available in most cities including Las Vegas and Reno.  These are also several times faster than the standard telephone line modem connections.  Contact your local cable provider for information on cable modem service.  Free access to the Internet may be available at your public library for those wishing to utilize this service.  Students at our state colleges and universities are routinely granted free Internet service.

In summary, to access the Internet a person needs a computer, a modem, and an Internet Service Provider (ISP).  For high speed connections, the telephone company or your cable company provider will be your ISP.  With standard telephone line connections, many ISPs are available.  Perhaps the most common are America-On-Line (AOL) and MSN (Microsoft Network).  One month’s free subscription to AOL is available utilizing their CD-ROM which can be found at most computer stores and book stores.  Other ISP providers include ISAT, ATT, and Netscape.  Most anyplace that sells modems will be happy to assist a person in selecting and signing on with an ISP.

INTERNET ADDRESSES GENERALLY

World Wide Web (www) addresses follow certain formats.  Academic institutions use an “.edu” designation.  For example  http://www.unlv.edu  is the address for the UNLV website. 

“http” stands for hypertext transfer protocol;  “www” stands for World Wide Web; “unlv” is the name of the school; and “edu” means it is an educational institution. 

Naming of government Web sites works in a similar fashion.  The U.S. House of Representatives is at, http://www.house.gov   The “gov” extension applies to government.   A “.mil” extension applies to the military.  For example:   http://www.army.mil   is the website for the U.S. Army.

Commercial sites are denominated “com”,  organizations’ sites end with “org”,  a loose affiliation uses a “net” suffix; however, exceptions exist.  Many of the “org” sites are helpful in cataloging government Web resources, such as citizen watchdog groups or civic organizations.

Almost all companies and corporations have Web sites ending with “.com”  If you’re not sure about an address, try using “com”   For instance, within law, there is information about green cards at http://www.immigration.com   Judicial addresses are found at http://www.courts.com These Web sites are starting points, with links to others in the same field.

Non-US end with a two letter abbreviation of the country.  Sites in Canada end with “.ca”, in France it’s “.fr” and sites in the United Kingdom end in “.uk”.  (The Parliament home page is http://www.parliament.uk/ and the Louvre Museum in Paris has an address of: http://www.louvre.fr/ )  In England “ac” denotes a school, instead of the US convention using “.edu”   The URL for Cambridge University is http://www.cam.ac.uk/

Addresses are case sensitive--it makes a difference whether you use upper or lowercase letters.

Additional elements of an address may indicate a subdirectory.  The Nevada state courts home page, located on the Nevada State computer, is at http://www.nv.gov/courts/   If a private individual has a Web site, the address will typically consist of the address of the private Internet provider, followed by a  ~  tilda and the person’s name, or an abbreviation of it.

Most of the medical and legal information available on the Internet is free, reliable and easy to sort through.  There are several possible approaches to locating medical and legal information on the Internet.  These include general searches with search engines.

SOME POPULAR SEARCH ENGINES

AltaVista

http://www.altavista.com/

Ask Jeeves

http://www.ask.com/

Excite

http://www.excite.com/

Google

http://www.google.com/

HotBot

http://www.hotbot.com/

Yahoo

http://www.yahoo.com/

Alternatively, and more efficiently, one can go to specific websites for information.  Many of these will have links to other related websites.  What follows are primarily non-commercial (free) websites: medical websites first, then health law websites, and finally law-related websites.

    MEDICAL INFORMATION SITES

American College of Physicians/American Society of Internal Medicine

http://www.acponline.org/

Cochrane Library

http://www.updateusa.com/clibhome/clib.htm

MEDLINE

PubMED

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed

Internet Grateful Med

http://igm.nlm.nih.gov/

Other Sources

http://www.medmatrix.org/

Scientific American Medicine

http://www.samed.com/

Clinical Evidence

http://www.evidence.org/index-welcome.htm

eMedicine

http://www.emedicine.com/

Medical Matrix

http://www.medmatrix.org/reg/login.asp

Medical World Search

http://www.mwsearch.com/

Journal listings

http://www.nthames-health.tpmde.ac.uk/connect/journals.htm

http://www.pslgroup.com/dg/medjournals.htm

Clinical practice guidelines

http://www.guidelines.gov/

http://www.cma.ca/cpgs

MD Consult (free 10 day trial, then about $ 200 per year; the University of Nevada School of Medicine makes this resource available for students and faculty)

http://www.mdconsult.com/

EBMR Reviews (OVID)

http://www.ovid.com/products/cip/ebmr.cfm

PHYSICIAN INFORMATION

Dept. of Health & Human Services Office of Inspector General

http://www.dhhs.gov/progorg/oig/cumsan/index.htm

List of Parties Excluded from Federal and Non-procurement Programs

http://www.arnet.gov/epls

Administrators in Medicine

http://www.docfinder.org/

American Board of Medical Specialties

http://www.certifieddoctor.org/

MediNet

http://www.askmedi.com/

MEDICARE

Medicare Carrier’s Manual

http://www.hcfa.gov/pubforms/pub14/pub14toc.htm

Medicare Information

http://www.medicare.gov/      

Medicare Rights

http://www.medicarerights.org/index.html

PATIENT AND CONSUMER INFORMATION

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

http://www.acog.org/

Children’s Hospital of Iowa Virtual Children’s Hospital

http://www.vh.org/

The HMO Page

http://www.hmopage.org/

Health Decisions, Inc.

http://www.hdi.com/

Dr. Koop’s Web Page

http://www.drkoop.com/

National Coalition on Health Care

http://www.nchc.org/

ObGyn.net

http://www.obgyn.net/

MEDICAL TRADE ASSOCIATIONS

American Association of Health Plans

http://www.aahp.org/

American Bar Association

http://www.abanet.org/

American Bar Association-Health Law Section

http://www.abanet.org/health/home.html

American Health Care Association

http://www.ahca.org/

American Health Lawyers Association

http://www.healthlawyers.org/

American Hospital Association

http://www.aha.org/

American Medical Association

http://www.ama-assn.org/

American Public Health Association

http://www.apha.org/

American Psychiatric Association

http://www.psych.org/

Association of American Medical Colleges

http://www.aamc.org/

Association of State Medical Board Executive Directors

http://www.docboard.org/

Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association

http://www.bluecares.com/

Health Insurance Association of America

http://www.hiaa.org/

Healthcare Financial Management Association

http://www.hfma.org/

Home Care Association of America

http://www.hcaa-homecare.com/

Medical Group Management Association

http://www.mgma.com/

Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

http://www.jcaho.org/

National Commission for Quality Assurance

http://www.ncqa.org/

ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE

Center for Alternative Medicine

http://www.sph.uth.tmc.edu/utcam

U.C. Davis Center for Complimentary and Alternative Research in Asthma

http://www-camra.ucdavis.edu/

FDA Guide to Choosing Medical Treatments

http://www.fda.gov//oashi/aids/fdaguide.html

National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine

http://altmed.od.nih.org/

Phytochemical and Ethnobotanical Databases

http://www.ars-grin.gov/duke/

Rosenthal Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine

http://cpmcnet.columbia.edu/dept/rosenthal

       HEALTH LAW SITES

HEALTH SITE SEARCH ENGINES AND JUMPSITES

American College of Legal Medicine

http://www.aclm.org/

American Association of Medical Colleges

http://www.aamc.org/

Database of Charitable Organizations (includes IRS Form 990 Information)

http://www.guidestar.org/

Doctor’s guide

http://www.pslgroup.com/Docguide.htm

Dr. Koop

http://www.drkoop.com/

General Services Administration-Fedlaw

http://www.legal.gsa.gov/

Healthcare Financial Management

http://www.hfma.org/

HealthWeb

http://www.healthweb.org/

Healthfinder

http://www.healthfinder.gov/

Hieros Gamos Guide to Law and Government

http://www.hg.org/

Infomine

http://www.info-mine.com/

Inside MEDICINE: Latest

http://www.lifestages.com/

Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Organizations (JCAHO)

http://www.jcaho.org/

MED WEB

http://www.med-web.com/

Medical Education Online

http://Med-Ed-Online.org/

National Commission on Quality Assessment

http://www.ncqa.org/

National Guideline Clearinghouse

http://www.guideline.gov/body_home_nf.asp?view=home

New England Journal of Medicine Online

http://www.nejm.org/content/index.asp

Nursing World

http:// www.nursingworld.org/

Patient’s Guide

http://www.pslgroup.com/PTGUIDE.HTM

Pharmulary

http://www.pharmulary.com/

St. Louis University School of Law

http://lawlib.slu.edu/centers/hlthlaw/

Today on Medscape

http://www.medscape.com/

U.S. National Library of Medicine

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/

Villanova’s Federal Web Locator

http://www.law.vill.edu/

Welcome to Americasdoctors.com

http://www.americasdoctor.com/

Your Surgery.Com

http://www.yoursurgery.com/

GOVERNMENT HEALTH STATISTICS

Census Bureau

http://www.census.gov/

Centers for Disease Control

http://www.cdc.gov/scientific.htm

General Accounting Office

http://www.gao.gov/

National Center for Health Statistics

http://www.cdc.gov/nchswww/

              LAW RELATED SITES

LAW SEARCH SITES 

Washburn Law School Library

http://www.washlaw.edu/

Georgia State University law search page, search court opinions from one page

http://gsulaw.gsu.edu/metaindex/

Search all state government Web sites from one page

http://www.findlaw.com/

State Court Locator, at Villanova Univ. Law School

http://www.law.vill.edu/

All court rules, from Genie Tyburski and Law Librarians Resource Exchange

http://www.llrx.com/columns/litigat.htm

Emory Law School Reference Desk, find law and dictionaries and everything else here

http://www.law.emory.edu/LAW/refdesk/toc.html

Constitutions from all states.  Constitutions listed below are posted by the states.

http://www.harbornet.com/rights/states.html

All state administrative codes

http://www.nass.org/acr/acrdir.htm

Search law reviews, at Findlaw, the leading law library on the Web, in Palo Alto, California

http://www.findlaw.com/

Address directory for all courts, from a private publisher

http://www.courts.com/

All State and Local Governments on the Net

http://www.state.me.us/states.htm

All municipal and county codes online, there are about 500 municipal and county codes online

http://www.spl.org/govpubs/municode.html   (very comprehensive)

http://www.municode.com/database.html

All county recorders in the United States address directory from Peelle Management Corp.

http://www.zanatec.com/home.html

NEVADA LAW SITES

UNLV Law Library, “Nevada Law Links”  (the outstanding law site for Nevadans)

http://www.law.unlv.edu/library/nevlinks.html

Nevada Revised Statutes and Administrative Code, session information, from the Legislature

http://www.leg.state.nv.us/

Clark County Bar Association “Legal Links”

http://www.clarkcountybar.org/legal_links.htm

Eighth Judicial District Court (Clark County)

http://www.co.clark.nv.us/distcrt/courthome.htm

Nevada Index

http://www.nevadaindex.com/

Nevada Supreme Court Library

http://www.clan.lib.nv.us/polpac/nsc/nscl.htm

Washoe County Bar Association

http://www.wcbar.org/links.html

Washoe County Law Library

http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/lawlib/related.htm

OTHER IMPORTANT NEVADA SITES

Nevada State Constitution

http://www.leg.state.nv.us/other/  (gateway page, links to annotated version)

http://www.leg.state.nv.us/other/Constitution.html  (download 1.8 mg file)

Live RealAudio broadcasts of the Legislature

http://www.leg.state.nv.us/audio/

Nevada Supreme Court opinions, last 90 days

http://www.leg.state.nv.us/scd/OpinionListPage.html

Attorney General opinions since 1993

http://www.state.nv.us/ag/agopinion/

Department of Business and Industry--agencies list

http://www.state.nv.us/b&i/

Washoe County Library, telnet to library catalog

http://www.washoe.lib.nv.us/

Second District Court, Washoe County, rules

http://www.distcourt.co.washoe.nv.us/

Las Vegas Municipal Court, traffic citation information

http://www.ci.las-vegas.nv.us/Las_Vegas_Municipal_Court.htm

Justice Court, Public Defender and District Attorney, Las Vegas Township

http://www.co.clark.nv.us/big12/safety/safety.htm

Clark County property tax assessments

http://www.lasvegas.com/features/taxes/

State Bar, member information

http://www.nvbar.org/

State of Nevada

http://www.state.nv.us/

Reno municipal code

http://www.cityofreno.gov/

NEVADA LOCAL GOVERNMENT SITES

Carson City

http://www.carson-city.nv.us/

City of Henderson

http://www.cityofhenderson.com/

City of Las Vegas

http://www.ci.las-vegas.nv.us/

City of North Las Vegas

http://www.ci.north-las-vegas.nv.us/cnlv/

City of Reno

http://www.reno.gov/

Clark County

http://www.co.clark.nv.us/

Washoe County

http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/

     FEDERAL LAW 

CONGRESS

U.S. Constitution

http://www.law.emory.edu/FEDERAL/usconst.html

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/bdsds/bdsdhome.html

U.S. House of Representatives and Senate--access to all federal law and complete law library for states, links to member and committee pages

http://www.house.gov/            http://www.senate.gov/

Live digital camera view of the House floor and legal lectures, in RealVideo

http://www.cspan.org/

Audio, video and text of Senate floor speeches

http://gov.electronic-cottage.com/

U.S. Code--several places to access statutes

http://fedlaw.gsa.gov/  (master index of federal laws online)

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/

http://uscode.house.gov/

Code of Federal Regulations, Federal Register and Congressional Record, GAO Comptroller opinions  (several versions)

http://lcweb.loc.gov/global/legislative/congress.html

http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/cfr-table-search.html

http://www.nara.gov/fedreg/

THOMAS--access legislation, Congressional Record, bill summary and status, etc. This is a really good place to do keyword searches for pending bills in House or Senate.

http://thomas.loc.gov

List of legislative resources on the Internet, including links to the House, Senate, GPO, and other congressional information sources

http://www.loc.gov/global/legislative/congress.html

http://www.loc.gov/global/legislative/mega.html

http://www.washlaw.edu/searchlaw.html

Uniform Commercial Code

              http://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/ucc.table.html