- Title
- Consumer health informatics in the information age and beyond
- Creator
- Pottas, Dalenca
- Subject
- Medical informatics
- Subject
- Information technology
- Subject
- f-sa
- Type
- text
- Type
- Lectures
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10948/20757
- Identifier
- vital:29386
- Description
- This paper reviews current and future trends and challenges in the field of consumer health informatics. Emergent innovations driving consumer health informatics in the information age include devices, tools and applications supporting personalised healthcare, electronic personal health record (PHR) systems and a plethora of tools in the health social media domain. Within this domain, a new kind of social media citizen, the consumer specialist or patient opinion leader, is taking the lead in online communities of patients. A new generation of personal health records combining PHRs and social media is emerging, even though pervasive adoption and use of PHRs remains elusive. The accuracy of information, security and privacy of personal health information, legislative matters and the digital divide remain recurring challenges of consumer health informatics. In future, PHR vendors will have to address the lack of espousal of PHRs in innovative ways to provide a compelling case for adoption. The continued uptake of health social media necessitates efforts to understand, through longitudinal studies, precisely who the users are, what they use it for and how it contributes to the achievement of both personal and public health outcomes. Health information consumers, of varying levels of techno-literacy, needs and preferences, must be assisted to move from simply accessing information to distilling relevant and credible information and making informed decisions. Further research is required to understand the changing relationships between patients and healthcare providers and how consumer health information technologies can best support these. There is a need to evaluate the effectiveness of consumer health information technologies to inform both public policy and the next generation of tools, technologies and artefacts that could better facilitate improved health outcomes. Lastly, more effort is required to erode digital inequalities. As we move into a future emphasising both the global and the individual, accelerated connectedness and speed of change, consumer health informatics must respond such that it remains germane and amplifies the value that can be gained by all stakeholders.
- Format
- 25 pages
- Publisher
- Nelson Mandela University
- Publisher
- Faculty of Engineering, the Built Environment and Information Technology
- Language
- English
- Relation
- Inaugural lectures
- Relation
- Inaugural lectures 2014
- Rights
- Nelson Mandela University
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Inaugural Lectures
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | SOURCE1 | CONSUMER HEALTH INFORMATICS IN THE INFORMATION AGE AND BEYOND | 324 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |