CHICAGO – When carpenter Greg Douglas rolled his pickup truck, his toolbox hit him and smashed his ribs and collarbone. After a month in the hospital, the medical bills hit him even harder, totaling $165,000.

PAT WELLENBACH/The Associated Press

Carpenter Greg Douglas shows some of the medical bills he received after he was injured when his truck rolled. His neighbors have held fundraisers to help pay the $165,000.

Douglas is among thousands of people now telling their stories on videos, ads and Web sites on both sides of the health care debate.

He said he was drawn into political advocacy after neighbors in Harpswell, Maine, raised $3,000 toward his hospital bills with a church dinner and collection cans in stores.

"People aren't standing up to be counted," Douglas said, explaining why he allowed his name to be used in a political YouTube video. "I just hope I can help somebody else."

The "Begging for Change" video, posted on YouTube by Maine's Service Employees union, depicts fundraising efforts on behalf of Douglas and other people with crushing medical bills.

Foes of expanding government-run health care also have stories of real people on YouTube and in advertisements. Ads by Conservatives for Patients' Rights feature patients like Katie Brickell, a British citizen, who says she was denied a Pap smear that could have saved her from cervical cancer.

"In all likelihood, I only have a couple of years," Brickell says in a YouTube version of her story. "I feel the National Health Service has let me down."

Voters and lawmakers may be moved by the stories or turned off by what they see as emotional pandering. But in the weeks to come, the airwaves and blogosphere are sure to be populated by real people telling what happened to them when they got sick.

Obama's political operation, Organizing for America, put up a Web site last week where people can post their own health care tales and read the stories of others.

What's lost in the storytelling is policy nuance and the difficult question of how to finance an expansion of health coverage, said health economist Devon Herrick of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis, a research group that favors private solutions over government involvement. The real-people tactic, whether used by the left or the right, can distract from tough debate, he said.

"We can't have policy by anecdote," Herrick said.

Families USA started its story bank before President Bill Clinton's 1993 failed attempt to retool the health care system. The group now has a database of thousands of people with stories to tell.

This week, Families USA and the drug lobby group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America launched a multimillion-dollar ad campaign using real people, including business owners.

Carla K. Johnson,

The Associated Press

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