Surgeon General Creates Online Tool to Help Users Organize their Family Health History

A new tool called “My Family Health Portrait” can help users organize their family health history online. The Surgeon General created the tool, which can run on any computer that is connected to the Internet and running an up-to-date version of any major Web browser. Users can organize their family health history, print it out for presentation to their family doctor and save the information to their own computer or even share it with other family members. The tool also creates a graphical representation of the user’s family’s generations and any hereditary health disorders.

Users can access "My Family Health Portrait" for free, and user information is not saved on any computer of the U.S. federal government.

The tool is part of a national public health campaign launched by the Surgeon General in cooperation with other agencies with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The campaign, called the Surgeon General’s Family History Initiative, aims to encourage all American families to learn more about their family health history.