Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans

The Internet has made health information more assessable to the general public. However, some serious concerns remain about the quality and reliability of that information, and the ability of the population to accurately interpret these data. An important aspect interpreting healthcare information a...

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Main Authors: Rosalía Vicente, M., Madden, Gary
Format: Journal Article
Published: 2017
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/53596
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author Rosalía Vicente, M.
Madden, Gary
author_facet Rosalía Vicente, M.
Madden, Gary
author_sort Rosalía Vicente, M.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description The Internet has made health information more assessable to the general public. However, some serious concerns remain about the quality and reliability of that information, and the ability of the population to accurately interpret these data. An important aspect interpreting healthcare information are eHealth skills. To date, the available evidence is usually based on national analyses of composite measures of eHealth skills. To contribute to the debate our paper analyses particular eHealth skills based on data from a pan-European Union data set. In particular, with microdata from a representative sample, five skills are analysed, viz. searching, locating, understanding, evaluating and using online health information. We use a discrete choice model to identify statistical associations between respondent socio-demographic characteristics and skills. Our analysis reveals a complex pattern of eHealth skills is present across socio-demographic groups, with only self-reported health status and Internet experience influential for all skills. This finding suggests that targeted training actions are necessary to improve eHealth kills, with the seniors and the less educated the groups most in need of training.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-535962017-10-26T06:59:43Z Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans Rosalía Vicente, M. Madden, Gary The Internet has made health information more assessable to the general public. However, some serious concerns remain about the quality and reliability of that information, and the ability of the population to accurately interpret these data. An important aspect interpreting healthcare information are eHealth skills. To date, the available evidence is usually based on national analyses of composite measures of eHealth skills. To contribute to the debate our paper analyses particular eHealth skills based on data from a pan-European Union data set. In particular, with microdata from a representative sample, five skills are analysed, viz. searching, locating, understanding, evaluating and using online health information. We use a discrete choice model to identify statistical associations between respondent socio-demographic characteristics and skills. Our analysis reveals a complex pattern of eHealth skills is present across socio-demographic groups, with only self-reported health status and Internet experience influential for all skills. This finding suggests that targeted training actions are necessary to improve eHealth kills, with the seniors and the less educated the groups most in need of training. 2017 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/53596 10.1016/j.hlpt.2017.04.001 restricted
spellingShingle Rosalía Vicente, M.
Madden, Gary
Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title_full Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title_fullStr Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title_full_unstemmed Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title_short Assessing eHealth skills across Europeans
title_sort assessing ehealth skills across europeans
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/53596