Sixty-five percent of consumers who seek health information online say they trust the data that they find, according to a survey by Wolters Kluwer Health, Healthcare Informatics reports (Healthcare Informatics, 5/22).
Survey Details
IPSOS, an advertising research company, conducted the survey of more than 1,000 U.S. consumers ages 18 and older.
The survey focused on consumer perceptions and practices related to using the Internet to answer medical queries (Roney, Becker’s Hospital Review, 5/17).
Survey Findings
According to the survey, 67% of respondents said that health care websites have made them better-informed patients.
The survey also found that:
63% of respondents said that they have never misdiagnosed themselves based on information found online;
48% said that they seek medical data online to be better informed before physician visits; and
4% said that they have experienced “cyberchondria” — a term used to describe a feeling of hypochondria after reading about medical conditions on the Internet (Hall, FierceHealthIT, 5/22).
