THE IMPACT OF PATIENTS' INTERNET USE ON MEDICAL PROFESSION: The Challenges of Online Patients and .com Health
FREDRIKSSON-BASS, JENNI (2012)
2012
Sosiologia - Sociology
Yhteiskunta- ja kulttuuritieteiden yksikkö - School of Social Sciences and Humanities
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2012-05-11
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:uta-1-22412
https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:uta-1-22412
Tiivistelmä
The purpose of this study is to evaluate how the availability of health information available through the internet is affecting the medical profession Finland. The availability of medical information via the internet is one of the factors explaining the changes in the position and construction of the medical profession. Patients’ use of the internet for health information is challenging a core feature of the medical profession: the monopoly over medical knowledge. Rather than evaluating the changes from ‘outside’, the patients’ point of view, the study evaluates the changes in the social position of the medical profession from ‘inside’, as the doctors themselves perceive it.
The research material was collected from semi-structured interviews conducted between November 2006 and January 2007. The material consists of 11 interviews with doctors from both the public and private sectors employed in Pirkanmaa region. The theoretical framework of the study is based on social constructionism, which puts an emphasis on the knowledge being socially constructed. The interviews were analysed as representations of the social reality of the study participants using the content analysis method. The approach to the data was inductive and therefore the analysis moves from the specific to the more general.
The study examines how the patients’ internet use has impacted the medical profession. On one hand the doctors perceived the patients’ internet use as something that offers new possibilities for both the patient and the doctor with regard to the relationship they have with their patients. The doctors experienced the patients’ internet use as a beneficial factor in terms of the patients’ increased knowledge of, and interest in, their own health. This in turn can improve the communication between the doctor and patient, resulting in a more equal relationship. The patients’ internet use has also impacted positively on the management of care and the maintenance of the doctors’ own expertise.
On the other hand, doctors experienced the quality and quantity of information, patients’ lack of skills, and the anxiety such information can cause in patients being reflected negatively in their tasks and the content of their work. The patients’ internet use has also had an impact on the core characteristics of profession, autonomy and authority. The patients’ internet use has affected the ability of the medical profession to function independently. The doctors’ authority, which is based on their claims of knowledge, skills and expertise over medical tasks, is also being challenged by patients’ internet use.
However, the medical profession is responding to these challenges by forming new forms of expertise. It is possible that the changes initiated by the patients’ internet use have changed the medical profession’s own understanding of profession and also had an impact on the way the general public conceptualise the medical profession. Nevertheless, patients’ internet use is not invalidating the need for the expertise held by the medical profession and the services provided by doctors.
Key words: medical profession, profession, doctor, patient, internet, health, information society, informatisation, doctor-patient relationship, qualitative research, social constructionism, content analysis.
The research material was collected from semi-structured interviews conducted between November 2006 and January 2007. The material consists of 11 interviews with doctors from both the public and private sectors employed in Pirkanmaa region. The theoretical framework of the study is based on social constructionism, which puts an emphasis on the knowledge being socially constructed. The interviews were analysed as representations of the social reality of the study participants using the content analysis method. The approach to the data was inductive and therefore the analysis moves from the specific to the more general.
The study examines how the patients’ internet use has impacted the medical profession. On one hand the doctors perceived the patients’ internet use as something that offers new possibilities for both the patient and the doctor with regard to the relationship they have with their patients. The doctors experienced the patients’ internet use as a beneficial factor in terms of the patients’ increased knowledge of, and interest in, their own health. This in turn can improve the communication between the doctor and patient, resulting in a more equal relationship. The patients’ internet use has also impacted positively on the management of care and the maintenance of the doctors’ own expertise.
On the other hand, doctors experienced the quality and quantity of information, patients’ lack of skills, and the anxiety such information can cause in patients being reflected negatively in their tasks and the content of their work. The patients’ internet use has also had an impact on the core characteristics of profession, autonomy and authority. The patients’ internet use has affected the ability of the medical profession to function independently. The doctors’ authority, which is based on their claims of knowledge, skills and expertise over medical tasks, is also being challenged by patients’ internet use.
However, the medical profession is responding to these challenges by forming new forms of expertise. It is possible that the changes initiated by the patients’ internet use have changed the medical profession’s own understanding of profession and also had an impact on the way the general public conceptualise the medical profession. Nevertheless, patients’ internet use is not invalidating the need for the expertise held by the medical profession and the services provided by doctors.
Key words: medical profession, profession, doctor, patient, internet, health, information society, informatisation, doctor-patient relationship, qualitative research, social constructionism, content analysis.