Digital Health Information for the Consumer: Evidence and Policy Implications

Citation

Guha, M. (2008), "Digital Health Information for the Consumer: Evidence and Policy Implications", Library Review, Vol. 57 No. 7, pp. 563-564. https://doi.org/10.1108/00242530810894149

When I started as a reference library assistant, some 40 years ago, one of my very first tasks was having to cope with a woman saying “The doctor says that my little boy has got something called ‘autism’. What is it, and are there any books on curing it at home?” This alerted me to the on‐going fact that clinicians are quite extraordinarily bad at explaining things to their patients. Traditionally the task of explaining what the doctor was actually on about fell to the receptionist, but nowadays she is too busy wrestling with the computerised appointments system to have time to talk to people, so other information services have to fill the gap. Advice on medicine and health matters forms some of the earliest writings known, in all the most ancient civilizations. It is still a sizeable proportion of all modern non‐fiction publishing. I noticed when reviewing a major encyclopaedia of medicine for another journal recently that a large proportion of all the 300 or so contributors were professional health writers (Guha, 2007).

There can be no other field of scientific, technical or even artistic endeavour where there are so many professional intermediaries, or where so many are needed. New forms of information technology have greatly expanded the ways in which health information can be made available to inquirers. This expansion has coincided with a growth in demand for health information. When my assistant was diagnosed with a (fortunately treatable) cancer some 20‐odd years ago we sent her into St Thomas’ with an armful of rolled up print‐outs from MEDLINE. This completely staggered her surgeon. He had never met an “informed patient” before. Nowadays every physician has to be aware that, however wide his general medical knowledge, someone suffering from a specific condition has the time and opportunity to have made a far more detailed study of it. There are on‐line discussion groups for people who have, or think they might have, the most recondite disorders.

This book reports on a research project based at University College London, evaluating three different digital health information platforms that were on offer to the general public in the UK between 2000 and 2005: the internet, touch‐screen kiosks, and, digital interactive television. This was probably the largest health consumer information research project ever, covering information service use by some hundreds of thousands of enquirers. The research focussed not merely on the information content of the three systems, but, much more importantly on the characteristics and behaviour of the information users. This book is therefore a useful contribution to the sociology of health as well as a solid foundation for any future studies of health information handling.

My main criticism of this book is Ashgate's curious decision to publish it in hardback with acid‐resistant paper etc, at a fairly high price. Right now, the information here is of importance and interest to a wide range of policy‐makers, planners and information managers. It should be distributed as widely as possible. The rate of technological change is such that in a very short time much of this book will be of historical interest only, or, at most, a basis for future comparative studies. Already the non‐web‐based interactive kiosks which formed a major part of this study have been phased out. From the sociological data given here it appears that these were used most by the poorest and least well‐educated of the information seekers sampled. It would be of some interest to find out whether it is true that the use of the internet has spread down the social classes to include these people or whether at least some of them have slipped through the gap and are no longer being catered for properly. Further research, based on the work reported in this book, is obviously needed. In the mean time, health librarians and information workers will find plenty to chew on here.