Start Date
10-12-2017 12:00 AM
Description
Online health communities offer unprecedented opportunities of empowering patients to take care of their own health and reducing the pressure of chronic diseases on the health service. Given the importance of knowledge for the empowerment of patients, the objective of this study is to understand the impact of knowledge sharing in online health communities on various aspects of health self-management. We develop a model to investigate 1) the factors that influence the level of community engagement in online communities and 2) the impact of engagement in online communities on members’ cognitive, behavioral, and emotional experiences of health self-management. We will empirically test our model through an online survey with the users of Diabetes.co.uk's forum. The study aims to provide a holistic perspective on the impact of a properly managed online health community on patients’ wellbeing.
Recommended Citation
Bernardi, Roberta and Wu, Philip Fei, "The Impact of Online Health Communities on Patients' Health Self-Management" (2017). ICIS 2017 Proceedings. 5.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2017/DigitalPlatforms/Presentations/5
The Impact of Online Health Communities on Patients' Health Self-Management
Online health communities offer unprecedented opportunities of empowering patients to take care of their own health and reducing the pressure of chronic diseases on the health service. Given the importance of knowledge for the empowerment of patients, the objective of this study is to understand the impact of knowledge sharing in online health communities on various aspects of health self-management. We develop a model to investigate 1) the factors that influence the level of community engagement in online communities and 2) the impact of engagement in online communities on members’ cognitive, behavioral, and emotional experiences of health self-management. We will empirically test our model through an online survey with the users of Diabetes.co.uk's forum. The study aims to provide a holistic perspective on the impact of a properly managed online health community on patients’ wellbeing.