ABSTRACT
Lately patients’ online activities have been the subject of substantial research efforts covering various aspects. Studies have concerned how patients become informed and empowered through online medical information (Dolan, Iredale, Williams, & Ameen, 2004; Morahan-Martin, 2004) and how this contributes to patients challenging the medical expertise (Hardey, 1999) and creating new demands on health care providers (Rice & Katz, 2001). Other studies are directed towards specific features of online activities such as patients’ use of cyber-doctor services (Umefjord, Petersson, & Hamberg, 2003) or self-help groups (Josefsson, 2005; Preece & Ghozati, 2001). Additional examples of scholarly work involve the influence of Internet use on the patient–doctor relationship (Anderson, Rainey, & Eysenbach, 2003; Rice & Katz, chap. 8, this volume). Further, issues related to information-seeking behavior of online medical information have been explored. For instance, some have focused on information seeking among health care professionals (Zhang, Zambrowicz, Zhou, & Roderer, 2004) whereas others have considered strategies for online information seeking among health consumers (Eysenbach & Kohler, 2002; Warner & Procaccino, 2004). Some studies have considered the risks of such activities and directed our attention towards issues of how to deal with unreliable medical information online (Adams & Berg, 2004; Eysenbach & Jadad, 2001).
