Do older adults use the Internet for information on heart attacks? Results from a survey of seniors in King County, Washington

Prevalence and characteristics of home Internet access in patients with cardiovascular disease from diverse geographical locations

“…In the present geographically diverse population with CVD, the finding that 66% of the patients surveyed had home Internet access is higher than the national average of 57% in 2004 (7) and higher than that reported in previous studies of patients with various diseases (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15). This may be due to the passage of time since the HIUS, because Internet access tends to increase steadily each year (16), with more recent studies reporting greater Internet access (14).…”

“…Similar values have been reported in the United States and Europe (8,9). For those with chronic disease, Internet access ranges from 34% to 65%, depending on the study (10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15). However, all of these studies were limited to patients living in large urban centres, and only one was conducted in Canada (15).…”

Attitudes of active older Internet users towards online social networking

“…In relation to both, we were able to show statistically significant differences. Gender differences in the use of computers and the Internet have already been identified (Koopman-Boyden & Reid, 2009;Meischke, Eisenberg, Rowe, & Cagle, 2005;Seybert, 2007) but, according to our study, such differences still exist. Interestingly, our study also revealed that the education level of active older Internet users does influence the frequency of computer usage; however, education is not related to the frequency of Internet usage-meaning that better educated active older Internet users use computers more frequently.…”

Examining Health Information–Seeking Behaviors of Older Adults

“…10 Other work has examined the extent to which older adults utilize the Internet to search for information on heart attacks and found that only 57% of older adults had access to the Internet, and of these about half sought health information on the Internet. 11 Haverhals et al 12 interviewed older adults to better understand their health information-seeking behaviors and found the majority of participants sought medication information from pharmacists and clinicians. Although physicians and nurses were highly valued as trusted sources for health related questions, many subjects felt their doctors were too busy to address information needs.…”