Thomas William "Tom" Ferguson was an American medical doctor, educator, and author. He was an early advocate for patient empowerment, urging patients to educate themselves, to assume control of their own health care, and to use the Internet as a way of accomplishing those goals.
Personal life, education, and career
He was born in Ross, California and grew up in Coos Bay, Oregon. He eventually settled in Austin, Texas, hometown of his wife Meredith Mitchell Dreiss. He obtained a bachelor's degree from Reed College in Portland, Oregon and a master's degree in creative writing from San Francisco State University. He then went to Yale University School of Medicine, graduating in 1977 with an M.D. degree. However, he never had a medical practice. Instead he became a prolific writer about patients as medical consumers and about the doctor-patient relationship, "arguing that informed self-care was a jumping-off point for better health and made for a richer, fairer, if nontraditional, partnership between physicians and their patients." He studied and wrote about the empowered medical consumer beginning in 1975, and about online health resources for consumers beginning in 1987. "He urged patients to educate themselves and share knowledge with one another, and urged doctors to collaborate with patients rather than command them. Predicting the Internet's potential for disseminating medical information long before it became a familiar conduit, he was an early proponent of its use, terming laymen who did so 'E-Patients'." He researched and promoted the popular use of electronic resources including the Internet to gather information and cope with medical conditions. In 1993 he organized the world's first conference devoted to computer systems designed for medical consumers.
Ferguson Awards
In 2002 he gave some "distinguished achievement awards" to leading individuals and organizations in the emerging area of "e-patients" and participatory medicine:
Gunther Eysenbach as "one of the most productive researchers, editors, and publishers in the online health field.", citing Eysenbach's research work as well as his publishing the Journal of Medical Internet Research as "the only peer-reviewed electronic e-health journal indexed by MEDLINE".
The Political Economy of Knowledge and the Changing Politics of the Philosophy of Science.
Medical Self-Care: Access to Health Tools, edited by Tom Ferguson
The People's Book of Medical Tests, by David S. Sobel and Tom Ferguson
The No-Nag, No-Guilt, Do-It-Your-Own-Way Guide to Quitting Smoking, by Tom Ferguson
Health Online: How To Find Health Information, Support Groups, And Self Help Communities In Cyberspace, by Tom Ferguson
Illness and death
He exemplified his own philosophy when he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 1991. "He relentlessly pursued strategies for both self-care and the newest research and experimental practices for controlling this aggressive cancer... Between relapses and debilitating treatments, he led a migration of medical consumer information to the internet, lectured widely on the emerging field of 'health informatics,' and earned a global reputation as a true innovator and pioneer in the field." He died April 14, 2006, while undergoing treatment in Little Rock, Arkansas.
