Society’s adoption of new media into everyday practices has over the past 15 years made drastic changes to the ways that people approach searching for information. Even with topics as personal as health and wellbeing, advanced Internet searches have the potential to not only change the traditional model of information exchange, but also to alter the very relationships between the various parties involved in the process (Wyatt et al, 2008). Lewis (2006) suggests that one of the many affects that this metamorphosis has had on the health industry is that the responsibility for looking after one’s own health has shifted further towards the individual and away from the government or broader society. But while there are benefits to this easier access to information – issues do arise over the credibility of some online sources and how they compare to a non-virtual health professional. Not all online sources of health information can be shown to have the patient or searcher’s health benefits as their primary interest. There is also the issue of subjectivity, some health information, especially that regarding treatments or diagnosis, cannot be applied to all readers, whether or not they do is better left to the discretion and expertise of a qualified health care professional.
References:
Lewis, T. (2006). Seeking health information on the internet: lifestyle choice or bad attack of cyberchondria? Media, Culture & Society, volume 28, issue 4: 521-539.
Wyatt, S., Harris, R. and Wathen, N. (2008). The Go-Betweens: Health, Technology and Info(r)mediation. In Mediating Health Information: The Go-Betweens in a Changing Socio-Technical Landscape. Sally Wyatt, Nadine Wathen and Roma Harris (eds), pp. 1-12. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
No comments:
Post a Comment