Although patients trust their doctor’s advice, they still go online to get better educated on their illnesses, in order to play an active role in their care, say researchers.

The study, conducted by researchers at the University of California, Davis, questioned more than 500 people who were active members of online support groups and who had made an appointment with a physician.

Xinyi Hu, who co-authored the study as part of her master’s thesis, said:

“We found that mistrust was not a significant predictor of people going online for health information prior to their visit. This was somewhat surprising and suggests that doctors need not be defensive when their patients come to their appointments armed with information taken from the internet.”

The researchers observed how the participants made use of support groups, other internet resources, and offline sources of information, before going to their doctors appointments.

According to the researchers, patients who took to the internet trusted their doctors just as much as patients who did not seek information online.

Hu explained:

“The Internet has become a mainstream source of information about health and other issues. Many people go online to get information when they anticipate a challenge in their life. It makes sense that they would do the same when dealing with a health issue.”

Even though the team found that physician mistrust did not predict reliance on the internet before a patients appointment, they found other factors that did. For instance, patients were more likely to seek information online if they believed that their medical condition was likely to persist. In addition, patients were more likely to take to the internet when they believed they had some level of personal control over their illness or when their health situation was distressful.

In addition, the team discovered that patients looked up information online in order to supplement offline sources, such as reference books, friends, and health news reports.

They explained: “With the growth of online support groups, physicians need to be aware that many of their patients will be joining and interacting with these groups. These patients tend to be very active health-information seekers, making use of both traditional and new media.”

The researchers found:

  • 70% of survey respondents were planning to ask their doctor questions regarding the information they found online.
  • 40% had printed information from the Internet to take with them to their appointment
  • More than 50% reported that they intended to make at least one request of their doctor based on the information they found online.

Richard L. Kravitz, a UC Davis Health System professor of internal medicine and co-author of the study, concluded:

“As a practicing physician, these results provide some degree of reassurance. The results mean that patients are not turning to the Internet out of mistrust; more likely, Internet users are curious information seekers who are just trying to learn as much as they can before their visit.”

Written by Grace Rattue