Who actually uses eHealth once they are online?
In HINTS 2012 (N=3959; 2358 Internet users), online eHealth use showed no racial/ethnic divide, but lower education predicted much lower odds of finding a clinician online (OR 0.50) or emailing a doctor (OR 0.46); women used eHealth more.
Source
Predictors of eHealth usage: insights on the digital divide from the Health Information National Trends Survey 2012
Study at a glance
- Design
- Cross-sectional — HINTS 4 Cycle 1 (Oct 2011–Feb 2012) mailed survey; multivariable logistic models of 11 eHealth tasks among online US adults
- N
- N=3959 · 3,959 HINTS respondents; eHealth models among 2,358 adult Internet users; response rate 36.7%
- Population
- US noninstitutionalized adults in a nationally representative HINTS sample; Internet users for eHealth-use models
- Outcome
- Odds of eHealth tasks across health care, information-seeking, and user-generated/sharing domains by SES, age, sex, and race/ethnicity
Structured fields used in claim comparison tables when every cited study has a complete layer.
What they did
Analyzed nationally representative HINTS 4 Cycle 1 mailed data (36.7% response) and ran multivariable logistic regressions on 11 eHealth tasks in three domains among adult Internet users.
What they found
No digital-use divide by race/ethnicity among the online. SES gaps were large for care and information-seeking. Female sex predicted care and sharing uses; age mainly affected information-seeking. Lower-SES, older, and male online adults were less engaged.
The limits
What it doesn't show
2011–12 mailed HINTS cannot describe today’s app landscape; access-to-Internet divides are excluded by restricting to users, and cross-sectional ORs are not intervention effects.
Key terms
- HINTS
- NCI Health Information National Trends Survey; 2012 Cycle 1 N=3959.
- eHealth
- Online tasks for care, information-seeking, and sharing/user-generated health content.
- Digital divide
- Here, differences in eHealth use among people who are already online, not only access.
- SES
- Socioeconomic status; education showed the most consistent eHealth gaps.
- OR 0.50
- High-school-or-less odds of looking online for a health-care provider vs higher education.
- Communication inequality
- Unequal ability to use health information channels, which can widen outcome disparities.
Flashcards
Research intelligence for this paper
See its role on concept claims, tensions it is part of, placement history, and related discoveries.
Quiz yourself
HINTS 2012 total N was about:
Common questions
Survey N?
3,959 HINTS respondents; 2,358 Internet users in eHealth models.
Race/ethnicity divide among the online?
No evidence of a digital-use divide by race/ethnicity.
Education OR to find a provider online?
0.50 (95% CI 0.33–0.76) for high school or less.
Who used eHealth more?
Women, across care and sharing domains.
More on Health equity