Association of online health information - Seeking behavior and self-care activities among type 2 diabetic patients in Saudi Arabia

Background: health information obtained from the internet has an impact on patient health care outcomes. there is a growing concern over the quality of online health information sources used by diabetic patients because little is known about their health information-seeking behavior and the impact this behavior has on their diabetes-related self-care,in particular in the middle east setting. objective: the aim of this study was to determine the online health-related information-seeking behavior among adult type 2 diabetic patients in the middle east and the impact of their online health-related information-seeking behavior on their self-care activities. methods: a cross-sectional survey was conducted on 344 patients with type 2 diabetes attending inpatient and outpatient primary health care clinics at 2 teaching hospitals in riyadh,saudi arabia. the main outcome measures included the ability of patients to access the internet,their ability to use the internet to search for health-related information,and their responses to internet searches in relation to their self-care activities. further analysis of differences based on age,gender,sociodemographic,and diabetes-related self-care activities among online health-related information seekers and nononline health-related information seekers was conducted. results: among the 344 patients,74.1% (255/344) were male with a mean age of 53.5 (sd 13.8) years. only 39.0% (134/344) were internet users; 71.6% (96/134) of them used the internet for seeking health-related information. most participants reported that their primary source of health-related information was their physician (216/344,62.8%) followed by television (155/344,45.1%),family (113/344,32.8%),newspapers (100/344,29.1%),and the internet (96/344,27.9%). primary topics participants searched for were therapeutic diet for diabetes (55/96,57%) and symptoms of diabetes (52/96,54%) followed by diabetes treatment (50/96,52%). long history of diabetes,familial history of the disease,unemployment,and not seeking diabetes education were the most common barriers for online health-related information-seeking behavior. younger age,female,marital status,higher education,higher income,and longer duration of internet usage were associated with more online health-related information-seeking behaviors. most (89/96,93%) online health-related information seekers reported positive change in their behaviors after seeking online health information. overall odds ratio (or 1.56,95% ci 0.63-3.28) for all self-care responses demonstrated that there was no statistically significant difference between those seeking health-related information online and non-health-related information seekers. however,health-related information seekers were better in testing their blood glucose regularly,taking proper action for hyperglycemia,and adopting nonpharmacological management. conclusions: physicians and television are still the primary sources of health-related information for adult diabetic patients in saudi arabia whether they seek health-related information online or not. this study demonstrates that participants seeking online health-related information are more conscious about their diabetes self-care compared to non-health-related information seekers in some aspects more than the others. ©amr jamal,samina a khan,ahmed alhumud,abdulaziz al-duhyyim,mohammed alrashed,faisal bin shabr,alwalid alteraif,abdullah almuziri,mowafa househ,riaz qureshi.