Family History

To properly find out your family history, you should first remember your ancestors. Try to recall information about your relatives such as where they were born, when they were born, what they did for an occupation and when they married and died.

Ask living relatives what they each know about your deceased relatives. Start with the family closest to you and work your way through more distant relatives. After you find out this information, you can do research through the computer on various sites, like Personal Ancestral File. Other popular websites include ancestry.com, familytree.com, and rootsweb.ancestry.com. However, you are probably more likely to find ancestors for your family tree in the census than in other historical records.

Health care professionals have known for a long time that common diseases can run in families. If one member of a family has high blood pressure, it could turn up in another member of a family. Finding out the various illnesses suffered by your parents, grandparents, and other blood relatives can help your doctor predict the disorders. The U.S. Surgeon General encourages all American families to learn more about their family health history to help prevent the development of inherited health disorders.

Since family health history is such an important tool, the U.S. Surgeon General has created something to help everyone create a portrait of their family's health. It is a web-enabled program that will run on any computer. This program helps organize family history information.