Delivering Preventive Health Care Information to More versus Less Health-Oriented Consumers: A Comparative Demographic Analysis

Preventive health care (PHC) is the awareness and efforts a person undertakes to enhance and preserve physical, mental, and emotional health for today and future. Although PHC information is widely available, people are not utilizing the information to improve their health. We examine PHC information sources utilized by persons who are more health-oriented vs. less health-oriented. The less health-oriented individuals were identified as: low educational attainment, low income, men, younger age, unmarried, and non-White. A factor analysis produced three primary sources of PHC information sources: print, institutional, and electronic and audio-visual delivery systems. An ANOVA compared how more health-oriented individuals differed from less health-oriented individuals regarding the importance of PHC information sources. As expected, men and unmarried individuals placed less importance on PHC sources information. Younger individuals placed greater importance on institutional and electronic sources of PHC information. Furthermore, non-Whites considered institutional sources of PHC to be more important than Whites, and those without college degrees considered print sources to be more important than those with college degree. There were no differences among income groups

An Attitudinal Analysis of Preventive Health Care Information Users: With Insights from Social Media

As the U.S. health care system continues to restructure itself, an increased emphasis on preventive health care will be a very important component. It is vital that preventive health care information (PHCI) be readily accessible and applied. This research explores the impact of social media as a source for accessing PHCI. Specifically, it examines how individuals rate active vs. passive internet delivery systems (IDS) to gather PHCI. Results of the study indicated that online health forums (active IDS) were the most popular source of PHCI, whereas Facebook and Twitter were most unpopular. On the whole, accessing PHCI via active IDS was strongly linked with those that were PHC oriented, and may become an important source of choice for PHCI

Who is Making Lifestyle Changes Due to Preventive Health Care Information? A 10 Year Comparison Study

This paper sought to describe from a set of 6 demographic and 13 lifestyle change variables the person who is significantly and positively impacted by preventive health care information (PHCI). Based on past research, six hypotheses were developed. Three of the six hypotheses were accepted. In addition, there were significant relationships for each of the six demographic variables with at least one of the lifestyle change variables. Those who are seeking and are positively impacted by PHCI are better educated, female, and (depending upon the lifestyle change variable in question) fall into a definite age category. There is partial support that more PHCI-oriented persons are married and have higher income. The most important lifestyle changes emanating from PHCI were “changes in eating habits,” “having periodic physician checkups,” “utilizing nutritional labeling,” and “not smoking.” “Getting regular exercise,” “losing weight,” “consuming less alcohol,” “reducing stress” and “changing sleeping habits,” were associated with the utilization of PHC information, but to a lesser extent

Preventive Health Care Information Delivery Systems: Is Social Media Relevant?

Preventive Health Care (PHC) is the awareness and efforts a person undertakes to enhance and preserve physical, mental, and emotional health for today and the future. This research examines the importance of online delivery systems as sources of PHC information. It examines how health care consumers respond to various online PHC delivery systems, with a special emphasis on social media (SM). Specifically different demographic groups are compared to determine the importance each group places on various online delivery systems. The results of a survey showed the 35-44 year old group placing the greatest importance of retrieving PHC information online. Older consumers indicated less importance for online delivery systems. Better-educated consumers indicated greater importance for formal online sources of PHC information. Likewise women considered formal sources more important than men. Among ethnic groups, Hispanics considered online sources most important