Abstract
Internet and e-health services have a substantial potential to support efficient and effective care for the elderly. The aim of the study was to investigate the use of Internet for health-related purposes among Polish elderly, the frequency and reasons of use, the importance of e-health services, and factors affecting their use. A total of 242 elderly at the age of ≥60 years were selected from the Polish population by random sampling. Data collection was carried out by phone interviews in October–November 2012. The study shows that the Internet was ever used by 32 % of the elderly and 1/5 claimed a regular use. Among the Internet users, 81 % of older people used it to obtain information about health or illness. The Internet was one of the less important sources of information (important for 27 % of respondents), face to face contact with health professionals and family and friends are still the most required source of medical information (75 %). Only 7 % of elderly Internet users approached the family physician, specialists, or other health professionals over the Internet. Factors that positively affected the use of Internet among elderly were male gender, younger age, higher education, living with family, mobile phone use, and a subjective assessment of one’s own health as good. The doctor’s provision of Internet-based services was important in the opinion of approximately 1/4 of older people. We conclude that the development of information and communications technology (ICT) tools increasingly meets the evolving needs of patients in the field of e-health. More and more elderly become beneficiaries of these services.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Andreassen HK, Bujnowska-Fedak MM, Chronaki CE, Dumitru RC, Pudule I, Santana S, Voss H, Wynn R (2007) European citizens’ use of e-health services: a study of seven countries. BMC Public Health 7(1):53
Beckjord EB, Finney Rutten LJ, Squiers L, Arora NK, Volckmann L, Moser RP, Hesse BW (2007) Use of the internet to communicate with health care providers in the United States: estimates from the 2003 and 2005 Health Information National Trends Surveys (HINTS). J Med Internet Res 9(3):e20
Bloom DE, Canning D, Fink G (2011) Implications of population aging for economic growth. Program on the global demography of aging. Working paper No 64. Available from: http://www.diseaseriskindex.harvard.edu/pgda/WorkingPapers/2011/PGDA_WP_64.pdf. Accessed 5 Feb 2014
Bujnowska MM, Pirogowicz I (2014) Support for e-health services among elderly primary care patients. Telemed e- Health 20(8):696–704. doi:10.1089/tmj.2013.0318. Epub 2013 Dec 20
Bujnowska-Fedak MM, Staniszewski A (2008) The needs of the Polish society concerning the use of medical Internet and e-Health services in the context of other European countries. In: Steciwko A (ed) Selected issues in family medicine, vol 12: Reducing diagnosis and treatment risks by leveraging knowledge and practices of health care professionals. Published by Continuo, Wrocław, pp 127–133 (Publication bilingual in English and Polish)
Bujnowska-Fedak MM, Staniszewski A, Steciwko A (2007) A survey of Internet use for health purposes in Poland. J Telemed Telecare 13(Suppl 1):16–19
Central Statistical Office. Demographic Year Book of Poland (2013) Available from: http://www.stat.gov.pl/gus/5840_rocznik_demograficzny_PLK_HTML.htm. Accessed 24 Oct 2013
Cresci MK, Yarandi HN, Morel RW (2010) The digital divide and urban older adults. Cin-Comput Inform Nurs 28(2):88–94
Duplaga M (2013) The acceptance of e-health solutions among patients with chronic respiratory conditions. Telemed e-Health 19(9):683–691
Fox S (2013) Pew Internet & American Life project. Pew Internet: health. Available from: http://www.pewinternet.org/Commentary/2011/November/Pew-Internet-Health.aspx. Accessed 24 Oct 2013
Glinkowski W, Sawinska M (2008) Consumers use of the internet health information resources: results of the Omnimas Polish Survey 2007. In: Blobel B, Pharow P, Zvarova J, Lopez D (eds) eHealth: combining health telematics, telemedicine biomedical engineering and bioinformatics to the edge. CeHR conference proceedings 2007. IOS Press, AKA, Berlin, pp 251–256. Available from: http://books.google.pl/books?id=e0aohtxt5bqc&pg=pa251&dq=glinkowski+sawinska&hl=pl&sa=x&ei=rr0eut3ammkio6idgegb&ved=0cdiq6aewaa. Accessed 29 Oct 2013
Jung M-L, Loria K (2010) Acceptance of Swedish e-Health services. J Multidiscip Healthc 3:55–63
Kummervold PE, Chronaki CE, Lausen B, Prokosch HU, Rasmussen J, Santana S, Staniszewski A, Wangberg SC (2008) E-Health trends in Europe 2005–2007: a population-based survey. J Med Internet Res 10(4):e42
Seybert H (2012) Internet use in households and by individuals in 2012. EUROSTAT. Industry, trade and services. Statistics in focus. Available from: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ity_offpub/ks-sf-12-050/en/ks-sf-12-050-en.pdF. Accessed 29 Oct 2013
Takahashi Y, Ohura T, Ishizaki T, Okamoto S, Miki K, Naito M, Akamatsu R, Sugimori H, Yoshiike N, Miyaki K, Shimbo T, Nakayama T (2011) Internet use for health-related information via personal computers and cell phones in Japan: a cross-sectional population-based survey. J Med Internet Res 13(4):e110
The World Bank Group (2011) Population projection tables by country and group. Poland. Available from: http://web.worldbank.org/wbsite/external/topics/exthealthnutritionandpopulation/extdatastatisticshnp/exthnpstatS/0,,contentMDK:21737699~menuPK:3385623~pagePK:64168445~piPK:64168309~theSitePK:3237118,00.html. Accessed 5 Feb 2014
Trotter MI, Morgan DW (2008) Patients’ use of the internet for health related matters: a study of internet usage in 2000 and 2006. Health Inform J 14(3):175–181
van Uden-Kraan CF, Drossaert CHC, Taal E, Smit WM, Moens HJB, Siesling S, Seydel ER, van de Laar MAFJ (2009) Health-related Internet use by patients with somatic diseases: frequency of use and characteristics of users. Inform Health Soc Care 34(1):18–29
WHO (2012) Ageing and life course. Ten facts on ageing and the life course. Available from: http://www.who.int/features/factfiles/ageing/ageing_facts/en/index.html. Accessed 29 Oct 2013
Acknowledgements
This article is part of a national survey on the use of the Internet and e-health services in Poland. The authors thank Edward Puchala, Paulina Kumięga, and Marcin Skrok for a methodological statistical help.
Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflicts of interest in relation to this article.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Bujnowska-Fedak, M.M., Mastalerz-Migas, A. (2014). Usage of Medical Internet and E-Health Services by the Elderly. In: Pokorski, M. (eds) Environment Exposure to Pollutants. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology(), vol 834. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/5584_2014_74
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/5584_2014_74
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-10002-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-10003-6
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)