Abstract
Objective To assess patterns of e-health use in pregnancy in an underserved racially diverse inner-city population, and to assess the accuracy of pregnancy-related information obtained from the Internet. Methods A cross sectional study of 503 pregnant/postpartum women belonging to an underserved racially diverse inner-city population who completed a survey regarding e-health use. To assess accuracy, four independent expert-reviewers rated the first 10 webpages on Google searches for each of five questions based upon those in ACOG bulletins. Results 70.8 % of pregnant/postpartum women belonging to an underserved racially diverse inner-city population were e-health users. E-health users were younger (mean age 29.4 vs. 31.2, P = 0.009), more likely to be nulliparous (50.3 vs. 21.3 %, P < 0.001), have English as their primary language (62.3 vs. 49.1 %, P = 0.014) and have a college/graduate education (78 vs. 26.6 %, P < 0.001). While 60 % of these women said e-health influenced decision making, only 71.3 % of them discussed their searches with their provider. Expert reviewers determined that the online information was fairly accurate (mean score: +1.48 to +4.33 on a scale of −5 to +5) but not uniformly accurate, and there was at least one webpage with inaccurate information for every question. Conclusions for practice Pregnant women frequently use e-health resources but do not routinely share their findings with their providers. Most, but not all, information obtained is accurate. Therefore it is important for providers to discuss their patients’ use, and help to guide them to reliable information.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
(2010). Census Results, United States. http://www.census.gov/2010census/data/ and http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/36/3651000.html . Accessed 22 June 2014.
Bert, F., Gualano, M. R., Brusaferro, S., De Vito, E., de Waure, C., La Torre, G., et al. (2013). Pregnancy e-health: a multicenter Italian cross-sectional study on Internet use and decision-making among pregnant women. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 67(12), 1013–1018.
Declercq, E. R., Sakala, C., Corry, M. P., Applebaum, S., & Herrlich, A. (2013). Listening to Mothers III Pregnancy and Birth. Report of the Third National U.S. Survey of Women’s Childbearing Experiences. May 2013 http://transform.childbirthconnection.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/LTM-III_Pregnancy-and-Birth.pdf . Accessed 22 June 2014.
Eysenbach, G., Powell, J., Kuss, O., & Sa, E. R. (2002). Empirical studies assessing the quality of health information for consumers on the world wide web: A systematic review. JAMA, 287(20), 2691–2700.
Fioretti, B., Reiter, M., Betrán, A. P., & Torloni, M. R. (2015). Googling caesarean section: A survey on the quality of the information available on the Internet. BJOG, 122(5), 731–739.
Fox, S. (2006). Online Health Search 2006. Pew Research Internet Project. http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media//Files/Reports/2006/PIP_Online_Health_2006.pdf.pdf. Accessed 22 June 2014.
Gao, L. L., Larsson, M., & Luo, S. Y. (2013). Internet use by Chinese women seeking pregnancy-related information. Midwifery, 29(7), 730–735.
Grimes, H. A., Forster, D. A., & Newton, M. S. (2014). Sources of information used by women during pregnancy to meet their information needs. Midwifery, 30(1), e26–e33.
Hardwick, J. C., & MacKenzie, F. M. (2003). Information contained in miscarriage-related websites and the predictive value of website scoring systems. European Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Reproductive Biology, 106(1), 60–63.
Huberty, J., Dinkel, D., Beets, M. W., & Coleman, J. (2013). Describing the use of the Internet for health, physical activity, and nutrition information in pregnant women. Maternal and Child Health Journal, 17(8), 1363–1372.
Kavlak, O., Atan, S. Ü., Güleç, D., Oztürk, R., & Atay, N. (2012). Pregnant women’s use of the Internet in relation to their pregnancy in Izmir, Turkey. Informatics for Health and Social Care, 37(4), 253–263.
Lagan, B. M., Sinclair, M., & Kernohan, W. G. (2010). Internet use in pregnancy informs women’s decision making: A web-based survey. Birth, 37(2), 106–115.
Larsson, M. (2009). A descriptive study of the use of the Internet by women seeking pregnancy-related information. Midwifery, 25(1), 14–20.
Laz, T. H., & Berenson, A. B. (2013). Racial and ethnic disparities in Internet use for seeking health information among young women. Journal of Health Communication, 18(2), 250–260.
Statistical portrait of the foreign-born population in the United States (2012). http://www.pewhispanic.org/2014/04/29/statistical-portrait-of-the-foreign-born-population-in-the-united-states-2012/#foreign-born-by-state-2012 . Accessed 22 June 2014.
Acknowledgments
We thank Dr Tinu Hirachan and Dr Lia Mamistvalova for helping us administer the questionnaire to our participants.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Narasimhulu, D.M., Karakash, S., Weedon, J. et al. Patterns of Internet Use by Pregnant Women, and Reliability of Pregnancy-Related Searches. Matern Child Health J 20, 2502–2509 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-016-2075-0
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-016-2075-0