Expanding the Walls of the Health Care Encounter: Support and Outcomes for Patients Online

• In Event: Scholar to Scholar VI
  In Scholar to Scholar Session: Serving and understanding patients better through interpersonal and mediated communication

Abstract

This paper assesses the contribution of online communication to health outcomes. We enrolled 109 patients in a web-based diabetes monitoring system. 196 messages were content analyzed. Messages that were personalized to the patient and the number of hypoglycemic events the patient had experienced before the program began predicted patients logging in. Information support and tangible support were both positive and significant predictors of patient’s activities of uploading their blood glucose readings over the system.

Authors

• James Robinson, University of Dayton

• Jeanine Turner, Georgetown University

• Betty A. Levine, Georgetown University

• Yan Tian, University of Missouri, St. Louis