Are you a doctor tired of getting patients that bring printed sheets of unverified medical information to you? Or are you a patient often anxious about your upcoming doctor’s appointment? Whether you are a doctor or a patient; patient education plays an important role in remedying countless such questions and enhancing the level of medical care that can be provided. 8 out of 10 people research their symptoms on search engines before going to the doctor. A large majority of them are unaware of the right sources to visit online

Online Patient education is a method for doctors to give healthcare information to patients effectively. Information can be in the form of web seminars, downloadable content, interactive videos, 3D illustrations, and audio/visual presentations. Online Patient Education is utilized in combination with in-person consultation of a doctor to help every patient individually.

Before computers, patient education came only through medical professionals. A physician used to be the only source of diagnosis, treatment, and understanding of the procedures. However, nowadays patients have a large amount of information on their fingertips thanks to smartphones. Pew Research Center’s study indicated that almost 75% of the patients go to the internet to look for medical
information, often before consulting a physician. Therefore, the biggest risk for a physician is the spread of misinformation. Compliance is one of the highest factors when it comes to a smooth treatment procedure and it is essential to develop trustworthiness and a partnership between the patient and doctor. Here are some more statistics from the study:

• Close to 77% of people said they started their search from Google, Bing or Yahoo.
•  About 13% said they searched on specialized sites
•  1% of the people said they searched on social media like Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Most websites that provide health information, do so in the form of subscriptions or pay per view.
• Close to 26% of the people that went online for information hit a paywall.
• Out of which only 2% were willing to pay, meaning the rest either looked for information elsewhere for free or decided to carry on their diagnosis with half the information that they had gathered.

This poses a great risk to both their health and to the medical procedure they will undergo.

Various Online Resources that a patient can access.

Here we explore each possible online patient education option that patients may stumble upon while looking for their symptoms:-

Academic or Government websites, Peer-reviewed journals.

Concerning the authenticity of medical information, these websites will provide the most legitimate fact-based information. However, the terminology may often be hard for an average person to understand. The content is usually very text-heavy. Other sites affiliated by medical societies and scientific journals are also good sources for medical information.

Websites of Independent MDs

Independent physicians often use websites for better outreach to their patients or for easier registration and catalogue. They can place external links to content verified by them to make patient education more accessible. As a specialist, a physician is the first filter between the patient and misinformation. If necessary, actions are made to cover as many online optionsto patient information as possible then it can improve the level of compliance significantly. Adding external links to your websites of sources you trust is usually much more effective than handing out brochures.

Open Source Aggregators

Various search engines, health and wellness sections on social media platforms like yahoo, facebook are open-sourced information platforms where anybody can write anything These are further down the ladder when it comes to authentic information. However, coincidently these are the most cited sources by the maximum number of patients.

How to prevent this? It is important to provide sufficient and easily accessible alternatives to patients in order to curb the effect from aggregators. While certain generic knowledge involving better lifestyle or health and hygiene are not bad. Fear propagating statements which are unverified or not backed scientifically become the biggest cause of concern.

Pharmaceutical Companies

The medicine industry is the primary source of funding for most research work in the field of medicines. However, it is always inclined to conflict of interest. A pharma company is very likely to dig into the positive aspects of the drug it is looking to bring to the market rather than conduct unbiased research on the disease. Still, most peer-reviewed studies from such sources are fact-checked.

How do platforms Medio and Medcomm by ERemedium help?

Medio

1. Streamline data easily to thousands of hospitals and patients.
2. Use OPD Waiting Area TVs to promote health literacy at the moment of highest impact.
3. Real-time reports on the performance.
4. Curated and authentic content of over 1000 videos in different languages.

Medcomm

1. Patient Education Facilitate easier and faster consultation. Provide an opportunity to study
   anywhere anytime.
2. Content Library Copyrighted content library consisting of 3D Anatomy, Gesture Driven
   videos. The centralized knowledge base of the latest research, clinical tools, medical
   information at fingertips.
3. Real-time sharing Doctors can share the treatment options, post-operative care with Patients
   and their Caregivers in real time.