• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

Susannah Fox

I help people navigate health and technology.

  • Home
  • Writing
    • greatest hits
    • beauty and wonder
    • demographics
    • featured commenters
    • health data
    • key people
    • peer-to-peer health care
    • positive patterns
    • public Q&A
    • trends & principles
  • Research
    • How Young People Use Digital Media to Manage Their Health
    • Digital Health Practices Among Teens and Young Adults: Key Findings
    • Fact sheet: teens and young adults, social media, online health resources
    • Fact sheet: differences between young women and young men in their use of social media, online health resources
    • Pew Research: Americans’ Data Worries
  • About me
    • Now
    • Curriculum vitae
  • Upcoming events

Poor and Elderly E-patients

August 6, 2007 By Susannah Fox Leave a Comment

The current issue of the Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved features an article based on a August 2006 survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Unfortunately, the full text of the article, “The Telehealth Divide,” by Mary Schmeida and Ramona McNeal is behind a subscription wall and press coverage may miss the subtleties of their findings. I was given a courtesy copy of the article and wanted to share a few details.

I love it when regression analysis uncovers a basic truth: “The Internet appears to be a double-edged sword, assisting in the search for health care information for the poor and elderly while magnifying existing gaps based on other factors.” Essentially, after all the statistical analysis is said and done, the researchers find that once online “individuals who are elderly or less affluent are more likely than their counterparts to take part in online searches for Medicare and Medicaid information.” I bolded the phrase “once online” because it is the key to understanding the implications of the data and this latest analysis. Americans age 65+ and those living in households with less than $30,000 in annual income are still disproportionately offline.

I applaud the authors’ work on this data set and recommend the article to anyone interested in understanding internet access disparities.

Share this:

  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: demographics Tagged With: digital divide, elderly, internet access, poor, seniors, underserved

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Before Footer

Don't miss a post

Enter your email address and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent Comments

  • Susannah Fox on Caregiver starter pack: “Thanks, Raj! You capture what I only implied: I wanted to send only what is absolutely necessary for this moment…” Jan 31, 12:38
  • Rajiv Mehta on Caregiver starter pack: “I know how important it is that the initial help is measured and focused — enough to be helpful immediately,…” Jan 31, 11:34
  • Susannah Fox on Caregiver starter pack: “Yes! Creating a habit of taking breaks, or putting on your own oxygen mask, is key. I realized that the…” Jan 31, 08:46

Footer

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets

Topics

  • Beauty and Wonder
  • Demographics
  • Key People
  • Participatory Research
  • Peer-to-Peer Health Care
  • Positive Patterns
  • Public Q&A
  • Trends and Principles

popular posts

  • Caregiver starter pack
  • Hack needed: Tiny pills, trembling hands
  • Engage with Grace
  • A taxonomy of health data

Explore

Copyright Susannah Fox © 2023 · WordPress · Log in

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.