Barriers and facilitators that affect public engagement with eHealth services

Hardiker, NR; Grant, MJ

Abstract

It is commonly accepted that public engagement with eHealth is beneficial. However, engagement is also variable. This ar-ticle presents the findings of a review of published evaluation studies around eHealth services. A targeted search of MEDLINE, CINAHL and EMBASE returned 2622 unique ab-stracts. 50 articles met the inclusion criteria and were sub-jected to further analysis. 6 review articles were used for post hoc validation. Four main types of eHealth service or re-source were identified: health information on the Internet; custom-built online health information; online support; and telehealth. 5 key themes emerged in terms of facilitators or barriers to engagement: characteristics of users; technologi-cal issues; characteristics of eHealth services; content issues; social aspects of use; and eHealth services in use. Recom-mendations arising from the review include: targeting efforts to engage those underserved by eHealth; maximizing expo-sure to eHealth across all sections of society; improving access to computers and the internet; appropriate design and delivery; ensuring content is relevant to different audiences; capitalizing on the interest in social computing; and clarifying the role of health workers in the delivery of eHealth.

Citation

Hardiker, N., & Grant, M. (2010). Barriers and facilitators that affect public engagement with eHealth services. In C. Safran, S. Reti, & H. Marin (Eds.), MEDINFO 2010: Proceedings of the 13th World Congress on Health (Medical) Informatics (13-17). Amsterdam: IOS Press

• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2010
• Deposit Date: Dec 1, 2010
• Publisher: IOS Press
• Pages: 13-17
• Series Title: Studies in Health Technology and Informatics
• Series Number: 160
• Book Title: MEDINFO 2010: Proceedings of the 13th World Congress on Health (Medical) Informatics
• ISBN: 9781607505877
• Publisher URL: http://www.booksonline.iospress.nl/Content/View.aspx?piid=17313