Family Medicine Patients' Use of the Internet for Health Information
"The physicians (n = 92) underestimate the proportion of their patients who used the Internet for health information"
Of course this is no surprise. Physicians don't quite "get it" how much people use the Internet for information.
Another implication for the future is the need to train physicians and medical students about discussing information brought to the office visit by their patients. Both qualitative7,8 and quantitative9 studies have reported that physicians can feel challenged by the patient who brings in Internet information, leading to degradation of the patient-physician relationship.
'nuf said.
technorati tags: Health Internet