Consumer Information and Education Needs

Objectives

• Define health literacy and eHealth.• Explore various technology-based

approaches to consumer health education.• Identify barriers to us of technology and

issues associated with health-related consumer education.

• Imagine future approaches to technology-supported consumer education.

Introduction

• The challenge for consumers and health care professionals alike is the proliferation of information on the Internet and the need to learn how to recognize when information is accurate and useful for the situation at hand.

Consumer Demand for Information• Consumer Empowerment -consumers are taking control of their health

and are not satisfied being dependent on a health care provider to supply them with information.

• The Pew Internet and American Life Project survey report of 2006 (Fox 2006) indicates that 8 in 10 of Americans who are online have searched for health information.

Consumer Demand for Information

• The survey is limited to those who are online, and does not reflect the health information needs or demands of those who are not online.

• The digital divide is the term used to describe the gap between those who have and those who do not have access to online information.

Consumer Demand for Information

• Missen and Cook (2007), discuss the potential impact that technology based health information dissemination can have on the know-do gap in developing countries.

• The know-do gap reflects the fact that solutions to global health problems exist but are not implemented in a timely fashion because of the lack of access to important health information.

Health Literacy and EHealth Initiatives

• The goal of health literacy for all is one that is widely embraced in many sectors of health care, and a major goal of Healthy People 2010.

- Health Literacy - “the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions".

Health Literacy and EHealth Initiatives

• developed to address the growing need for managing health information and to promote technology as a means of improving health information exchange, health literacy and health care delivery.

Health Care Organization Approaches to Education

1. Patient Education information stored electronically so that changes can be made as needed or information can be better tailored to the specific patient situation and then printed out and reviewed with the patient.

2. Many HCO’s sponsor health promotion education classes as a way of marketing their facilities and showcasing some of their expert practitioners.

Health Care Organization Approaches to Education

3. Promote education via pamphlet distribution, health promotion programs broadcast on TV, and health information kiosks.

• One caution : Just because the information is made available does not mean that people will participate or that they will understand what they have experienced.

Promoting Health Literacy in School Aged Children

• Promoting health literacy in school aged children presents special challenges to health educators.

• The Children’s Nutrition Research Center has responded to these challenges by supporting the development of nutrition education programs as interactive computer games, video games, and cartoons referred to as ‘edutainment’ (Flores 2006).

Promoting Health Literacy in School Aged Children

• Donovan (2005) describes an Interdisciplinary WebQuest designed to appeal to older school aged children.

• The Quest is interdisciplinary in that it requires reading comprehension, critical thinking, presentation, and writing so that core skills and health literacy skills are learned in a single assignment.

Promoting Health Literacy in School Aged Children

• Nurses and other health care providers need to embrace the Internet as a source of health information for patient education and health literacy.

• Patients are increasingly turning there for ‘instant’ information about their health maladies.

Patient Education

• The Health on the Net (HON) Foundation Survey (2005) describes the certifications and accreditation symbols that identify trusted health sites.

• The HONcode and Trust-e were identified as the two most common symbols that power users look for.

Patient Education

Pew Internet Survey (2006)

• 75% of online searchers do not check the date or the source of information they are accessing on the web

• 3% of online health seekers report knowing someone who was harmed by following health information found on the web.

Patient Education

• The US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health sponsor MedlinePlus a web site that has a tutorial for learning how to evaluate health information as well as an electronic guide to web surfing that is available in both English and Spanish.

Future Directions

• Predicting future directions for technology based health education is somewhat difficult, because we may not be able to completely envision the technology of the future.

• Piette (2007) describes the use of Interactive Behavior Change Technology (IBCT) to improve the effectiveness of diabetes management.

Future Directions

• The goal of the IBCT is to improve communication between patients and health care providers and provide educational interventions to promote better disease management between visits.

Thought Provoking Questions

• How do you envision technology enhancing patient education in your setting?

• Formulate a plan evidencing a potent patient education episode on MRSA. Provide a rationale for each approach and describe a tool you would use to educate the patient and his/her family.