Internet Medical and Health Information
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Internet Medical and Health Information
General Information
NEWS:
Better Grasp of Health Info May Boost Life Span "Being better able to read and understand health-related information might help you live longer, a new study finds. "Inadequate health literacy is associated with less knowledge of chronic disease and worse self-management skills for patients with hypertension, diabetes mellitus, asthma and heart failure," concluded a team from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago. "
Consumers prefer the 'personal touch' for online health "He said drugs companies had been known to sponsor self-help sites which appeared at first glance to be independent."
Consumers Rely on Google for Online Health Searches "Online search tools increasingly are being used to find health information, but it can be difficult to determine what information is trustworthy, Government Health IT reports."
Do European Residents Use the Internet To Find Health Information? "The countries in Northern and Central Europe reported the highest percentage of Internet health users. In 2007, 72% of survey respondents in Denmark said they use the Internet to search for health information, while 67% of survey respondents in Norway and 57% of survey respondents in Germany said they use the Internet to search for health information."
Have You Researched a Health-Related Topic Online in the Past Year?
Internet Used Nearly as Much as Physicians for Health Info "The number of U.S. adults who use the Internet as a source of medical information is almost equal to the number that would consult their personal physicians, according to a Harris Interactive poll, Computerworld reports."
New Report Indicates Changes in How Americans Get Their Information about Health and Cancer
Online Health Data Transform Doctor-Patient Relationships "The physician-patient relationship is changing as patients increasingly are going online for health information and take more responsibility for their care, Dow Jones Business News reports. A recent Manhattan Research study found that nearly two-thirds of physicians say the growing trend of patients coming to physician visits with online health information is positive, up from 63% of physicians in 2004. Of the 1,300 U.S. physicians surveyed, 52% said they recommend health Web sites to their patients. However, specialists -- such as neurologists, surgeons and cardiologists -- tend to be less enthusiastic about patients bringing in online health information than primary care physicians and oncologists, Mark Bard, president of Manhattan Research, said."
Poll: More U.S. Adults Seek Health Information Online "Rick Kellerman, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, said that more people searching the Internet for health information means that consumers are getting more involved in their care because of online resources."
Survey: Chronic Disease Patients Less Likely To Go Online "The Pew Internet and American Life Project on Monday released a survey that found that U.S. residents with disabilities and chronic conditions are less likely than others to use the Internet, although once they are online, they use the Internet as much as those without chronic conditions, AP/USA Today reports (Jesdanun, AP/USA Today, 10/9)."
Survey: Employees Tap Internet for Additional Health Information "Sixty-eight percent of workers in large companies reported consulting Web sites for additional health information when making treatment decisions, according to a survey released Wednesday by the National Business Group on Health, AHA News reports."
Web sites encourage patients to share on illnesses, doctors
What Resource Do U.S. Consumers Trust Most for Rx Drug Information? "Seventy-five percent of respondents said that the Internet is their most trusted resource for drug treatment information, according to a new survey by online marketing company Prospectiv. Fifteen percent of respondents said broadcast media was their most trusted resource for drug treatment information, while 10% said they trusted magazines the most."
What Type of Health Videos Would You Be Interested in Watching Online?
Where do patients go for medical information on the Internet? "Most of the traffic goes to "official" government, disease association, and drug maker Web sites, says a study released by Envision Solutions, a New York-based health marketing company. But patients also visit user-generated sites like Wikipedia, bulletin boards, or blogs-in which users can write or edit entries without identification or presentation of credentials. Specifically, the study found that in a search for "diabetes" on the Google or Yahoo search engines, 31.9% of all traffic went to the American Diabetes Association Web site and 7.9% went to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Web site.
Women top men as seekers of online health info "The finding is consistent with gender differences in healthcare utilization; for instance, women are more apt than men to go to the doctor when sick, the researchers say."
ARTICLES:
Cancer Communication: Health Information National Trends Survey 2003 and 2005
Finalized Out-of-Hospital Patient Management Guidelines (Poisoning Guidelines)
Online Health Research Is Widespread, but Few Check the Source and Date
JOURNAL ARTICLES:
A study of cancer information for cancer patients on the internet. (Int J Clin Oncol. 2007)
A Study of Information Seeking by Cancer Patients and their Carers. (Clin Oncol (R Coll Radiol). 2007) "CONCLUSIONS: The Internet is an effective means of information provision in those who use it. Facilitated Internet access and directed use by health professionals would be effective ways of broadening access to this medium."
A web site on lung cancer: who are the users and what are they looking for? (J Thorac Oncol. 2007)
An Analysis of Cluster Headache Information Provided on Internet Websites (Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain 2007) "Conclusion.—There are numerous cluster headache websites that can be found on the Internet. The quality of most of the websites dedicated to cluster headache is mediocre, and although there are some excellent cluster headache websites, these sites may be challenging for many users to locate. There was no significant difference in the overall quality of websites oriented for patients or healthcare providers providing cluster headache information evaluated in this study. In addition, websites providing high-quality cluster headache information are written at an educational level too high for a significant portion of the general population to fully utilize."
Chronic illness and health-seeking information on the Internet. (Health (London). 2007) "The findings suggest that it is not merely the presence of a particular chronic illness, but rather the total number of chronic conditions that determine Internet use. Also, the more frequently a person uses the Internet as a source of health information, the more likely they are to change their health behavior."
[Danes and their use of the Internet for health-related purposes] (Ugeskr Laeger. 2007) "RESULTS: 60% of the Danish population use the Internet to seek health-related information. The Internet is especially used for health purposes by people with a high education, by women, by people with poor health and by people with children. Every fourth Dane experiences feelings of reassurance or relief after having read about illness on the Internet and this number is 3 times higher than the number of people that experience concern and anxiety. 3% state that they have changed their medication after having read information on the Internet and this is done without prior contact to their doctor. 8% of Danes have at some point consulted their doctor over the Internet, and if given the opportunity, 58% would read their own patient record online."
Expert searching in consumer health: an important role for librarians in the age of the Internet and the Web. (J Med Libr Assoc. 2007) "DISCUSSION: The results demonstrate that, despite the end-user driven Internet, patients and families are not able to find all the information they need on their own. Expert searching remains an important role for librarians working with consumer health information seekers."
Have Online Consumers Used Health Search Engine Sites To Find Health Information? " … 32% of respondents who have used a health search engine said they find the amount of health information available online intimidating, compared with 14% of respondents who have not used a health search engine, according to the survey."
Health Literacy and Mortality Among Elderly Persons (Arch Intern Med. 2007) "Background Individuals with low levels of health literacy have less health knowledge, worse self-management of chronic disease, lower use of preventive services, and worse health in cross-sectional studies. We sought to determine whether low health literacy levels independently predict overall and cause-specific mortality. … Conclusions Inadequate health literacy, as measured by reading fluency, independently predicts all-cause mortality and cardiovascular death among community-dwelling elderly persons. Reading fluency is a more powerful variable than education for examining the association between socioeconomic status and health."
How do patients evaluate and make use of online health information? (Soc Sci Med. 2007)
Information from the Internet and the doctor-patient relationship: the patient perspective - a qualitative study. (BMC Fam Pract. 2007)
Internet information on colorectal cancer: commercialization and lack of quality control. (Colorectal Dis. 2007) "Conclusion The internet is becoming an essential tool for disseminating information about CRC to consumers. Half of the links on CRC are commercially oriented, containing information on goods or private health services. Less than 1% information is being provided by professional societies. To provide relevant CRC information, key consensus criteria for evaluating healthcare-related websites have to be established. There is an urgent need for CRC information on the internet to be regulated through the establishment of government-funded organizations (e.g. NHS) or professional societies (e.g. ACPGBI)."
Language preferences on websites and in google searches for human health and food information. (J Med Internet Res. 2007)
Online Health Promotion, Early Identification of Difficulties, and Help Seeking in Young People. (J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2007) "CONCLUSIONS:: Results are consistent with a health-needs model of utilization of this Internet-based health resource. A school-based health information Web site holds significant promise for health promotion and early self-identification for emotional problems."
The risk of using the Internet as reference resource: A comparative study. (Int J Med Inform. 2007)
The use of the World Wide Web by medical journals in 2003 and 2005: an observational study. (Pediatrics. 2007)
Use of computers and the Internet by residents in US family medicine programmes. (Med Inform Internet Med. 2007)
Websites for the busy primary care practitioner. (J Fam Health Care. 2007)
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