Study on E-Health Utilization among Nigerian University
Undergraduate Students
Ngozi Marion Emmanuel, Ogochukwu Charity Ekwenchi and Allen Nnanwuba Adum
Department of Mass Communication, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State, Nigeria
Keywords: E-health, Utilization, Undergraduate Students.
Abstract: E-health is a relatively new area in healthcare delivery largely supported by electronic processes and
communication. The increasing need to better inform people about health practices and actions has been
fingered to be the primary reason for the rise of e-health communication as a means of introducing ideas and
information on better health practices and safer solutions to health issues. Driven on the wheels of new
media technologies like the internet, it is arguably a way of getting health information without stress and
almost without cost. This paper, conducted as a study, focuses on Nigerian University undergraduate
students and the extent they utilize e-health resources and subsequently take appropriate health actions. It
also explores how useful e-health has been in improving undergraduate students’ health practices in Nigeria.
One of the major questions posed in this study is whether Nigerian University undergraduate students are
knowledgeable about e-health and as such are they exposed to e-health resources? The paper employed the
survey research design where 400 respondents were studied across two Universities in South-East Nigeria.
Findings revealed that about 60% of Nigerian undergraduate students rely on e-health to take proactive
health actions.
1 INTRODUCTION
Information is fundamental to choice and making
informed decisions. Without information, there is no
choice. Information helps knowledge and
understanding. It gives patients the power and
confidence to engage as partners with their health
service. (United States Department of Health, 2004,
p. 2)
The essence of health communication cannot be
overemphasized in an age where disinformation
about health issues abounds. More importantly,
communication is central to the field of health
communication, as Berry (2007) puts it
communication here is a means by which health
information is imparted and shared with others.
Hargie and Dickson (2004) framed communication
as central to the very essence of human conditioning.
The health sector is such that especially demands
effective and efficient communication. According to
Schofield (2004), “effective communication was a
drug that can be prescribed”.
Subsequently, healthcare givers are always seeking
for ways to better inform and educate both their
patients and seekers of health information. As
captured by Pettigrew and Logan (1987),
communication advances both health and illness in a
society, and drives the system to run at optimal or
marginal effectiveness. Having underscored the
importance of communication to the field of health,
it is important to note that there are different kinds
of communication engaged in by healthcare givers
targeted at specific audience. Moreover, healthcare
givers appear to be engaged in seeking for ways to
better inform an audience who are relentlessly
seeking health information. Consequently, modes of
communicating health messages have become
dynamic especially with the advent of the new
media. It is almost now commonsensical that we live
in the information era, (Mattelart, 2003), and for
staying healthy, which is the primary concern of all
people, health communication becomes pertinent in
whatever mode or form.
2 THE MANY POTENTIALS OF
THE NEW MEDIA PLATFORM
In the 21
st
century, nations are being faced with
increasing concerns about health problems,
478
Marion Emmanuel N., Charity Ekwenchi O. and Nnanwuba Adum A..
Study on E-Health Utilization among Nigerian University Undergraduate Students.
DOI: 10.5220/0005226404780482
In Proceedings of the International Conference on Health Informatics (HEALTHINF-2015), pages 478-482
ISBN: 978-989-758-068-0
Copyright
c
2015 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)
particularly chronic diseases such as diabetes, and
escalating health care costs. Our society is becoming
more diverse in every conceivable way, and
diversity is often, though not always, associated with
health disparities, (Institute of Medicine, US, 2002).
One of the ways through which healthcare givers
and governments have devised to inform people
about health issues is through the platform of the
new media which have been known to have
potentialities like speed, space, ubiquity and
seamlessness.
The term ‘new media’ as passed mostly un-
interrogated as most scholars have accepted it as a
term used to describe a body of media technologies
different from the traditional ones. We live in an
increasingly inter-networked society powered by
countless technological innovations; the new media
for one. The new media, particularly the internet, are
pervasive, (Green, 2010). With the help of recent
technological advancements and applications
development, the new media have overcome the
challenges inherent in the traditional media such as
strict controls and gate-keeping as the new media
offer a discursive platform popularly referred to as a
public sphere.
Green (2010) posits that once information is
digitized, it can be handled in consistent and
effective ways which allow a blurring of functions
and the emergence of hybrid technologies.
According to her, “increasingly, new media
technologies can perform more functions in more
varied contexts; such as accessing the internet from
a mobile phone...” These potentials therefore,
underscore the
usefulness of the new media to
sensitive sectors like the health sector and explain
further why healthcare givers and governments have
adopted these platforms of the new media to reach
out to health information consumers.
3 THE INTERNET AND HEALTH
INFORMATION: THE
CONCEPT OF E-HEALTH
As explained above, the many potentials of the
internet have prompted healthcare givers and nations
to adopt the internet as a channel for communicating
health messages to people who are increasingly in
search for health information. This concept has been
variously referred to as e-health, electronic health or
internet health.
According to Eysenbach (2001), e-health as an
emerging field is the intersection of medical
informatics, public health and business, mostly
referring to health services and information
delivered or enhanced through the internet and
related technologies. Eysenbach believes that in a
way, e- health encompasses a way of thinking and
commitment for networked, global thinking to
improve healthcare locally, regionally, and globally
through the use of technologically empowered
platforms like the internet. Eysenbach made some
valuable assumptions about the broad application of
e-health to include:
Efficiency - One of the promises of e-health is
to increase efficiency in health care, thereby
decreasing costs.
Enhancing quality of care - Increasing
efficiency involves not only reducing costs, but
at the same time improving quality.
Evidence based - E-health interventions
should be evidence-based in a sense that their
effectiveness and efficiency should not be
assumed but proven by rigorous scientific
evaluation. Accordingly, much work still has to
be done in this area.
Empowerment of consumers and patients - By
making the knowledge bases of medicine and
personal electronic records accessible to
consumers over the Internet, e-health opens
new avenues for patient-centered medicine, and
enables evidence-based patient choice.
Encouragement of a new relationship between
the patient and health professional, towards a
true partnership.
Education of physicians through online
sources (continuing medical education) and
consumers (health education tailored
preventive information for consumers)
Enabling information exchange and
communication in a standardized way between
healthcare establishments.
Extending the scope of healthcare beyond its
conventional boundaries. E-health enables
consumers to easily obtain health services
online from global providers.
Ethics - E-health involves new forms of
patient-physician interaction and poses new
challenges and threats to ethical issues such as
online professional practice, informed consent,
privacy and equity issues.
Equity - to make healthcare more equitable is
one of the promises of e-health, but at the same
time there is a considerable threat that e-health
may deepen the gap between the "haves" and
"have-nots". People, who do not have the
money, skills, and access to computers and
StudyonE-HealthUtilizationamongNigerianUniversityUndergraduateStudents
479
networks, cannot use computers effectively. As
a result, these patient populations (which
would actually benefit the most from health
information) are those who are the least likely
to benefit from advances in information
technology, unless political measures ensure
equitable access for all. The digital divide
currently runs between rural vs. urban
populations, rich vs. poor, young vs. old, male
vs. female, and between neglected/rare vs.
common diseases. (Adapted from Eysenbach
G, 2001)
As clearly reviewed above by Eysenbach, e-health
embodies multiple usages.
4 AIMS OF THE STUDY
Students are placed as chief users of internet
facilities and as such, in a generation supposedly
prone to growing health concerns, this study appears
apt for a number of reasons:
To determine the extent to which Nigerian
students are connected to the internet
To ascertain their knowledge of e-health
To explore the extent to which they are
exposed to e-health resources
To determine whether or not they utilize e-
health resources
Subsequently, four principal research questions were
posed for this study:
To what extent are Nigerian students connected
to the internet?
What is their level of knowledge about e-
health?
To what extent are they exposed to e-health
resources?
Do they utilize e-health resources?
5 THEORETICAL BASIS
This study is anchored on the Health Belief Model.
The HBM was postulated to explain health behavior,
suggesting that people’s beliefs about health
problems, perceived benefits to action and barriers
to action explain engagement or lack of engagement
in health promoting behavior. The model was
developed in the 1950s by social psychologists
Rosenstock et al, at the US public health service to
better understand the widespread failure of screening
programs for tuberculosis.
This theory is a ready foundation for this study on e-
health utilization among Nigerian Undergraduate
students in order to unbutton their level of utilization
of e-health resources and subsequently, find out
whether or not they take health action consequent
upon exposure to e-health resources. When the result
of this study turns out that a majority of the students’
source health information online and consequently
take health action, it will then support the HBM that
states that people only take health action based on
perceived health beliefs and benefits.
6 METHOD
The research methodology adopted here is survey
research design. Within a population of
approximately 40,000 students body in both
universities studied, a sample size of 400 was drawn
using the Taro Yamane’s formula for sample
selection. The instrument of data collection was the
questionnaire. The questionnaire used here was a
structured, pre-coded mini-document used to elicit
response from respondents who simply ticked
correct answers as they explain their disposition. In
all, it was a 20-item questionnaire. Data was then
analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social
Sciences.
7 FINDINGS
Some of the major findings are discussed below:
Figure 1: Sex of Respondents.
Figure 2: Age of Respondents.
Above, age bracket 18-22 has the most of
respondents.
HEALTHINF2015-InternationalConferenceonHealthInformatics
480
Figure 3: Respondents’ with internet enabled-phones.
66% of the respondents owned internet enable
phones.
Figure 4: Respondents’ with internet-enabled PC.
Figure 5: What is E-Health?
In the above data collected, most of the respondents
are internet enabled one way or the other.
Additionally, a good number of the students are
aware of what e-health is.
Out of the many health concerns raised in the
questionnaire, respondents were most concerned
about the following:
Figure 6: Respondents’ Obssessed about sugar-intake.
Figure 7: Respondents’ Concerned about Pimply faces.
Figure 8: Respondents’ concerned about STIs.
As depicted above, the respondents were concerned
about sugar-intake, pimply faces, and most
importantly, contracting sexually transmitted
infections.
Figure 9: Respondents’ who have sourced health info
online.
Figure 10: Respondents’ who have been helped by health
messages sourced online.
Figure 11: Respondents’ who take proactive health action
based on medical advise sourced online.
In summary, the findings show a good number of the
respondents said they take proactive health action
based on medical/health advice sourced online.
0
50
100
150
200
250
StudyonE-HealthUtilizationamongNigerianUniversityUndergraduateStudents
481
8 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Summarily, our data revealed that most Nigerian
students are internet-enabled. More than 66% of the
respondents are aware and knowledgeable about e-
health; and the chief among health concerns for
these young people is that of contracting STI
(Sexually Transmitted Infections). About 60% of the
respondents have sourced health information online
and about 60% have taken proactive health action
based on medical/health information sourced online.
9 RECOMMENDATIONS
Arising from the result of our study then, we take
this position that: e-health is a fresh-out branch of
medicine and healthcare delivery and should be
considered important by nations. As revealed in our
study, a lot of young people in Nigeria rely on
internet information. Therefore, being that the
internet is a gateless medium; our advice is for
young people to seek supplementary advice with
their caregivers and health advisers so as not to
make a wrong health move. We also recommend the
following:
In an e-world where everything is going
electronic, Nigerian undergraduates should be
better educated about the uses of e-health as the
term embodies a lot of benefits as highlighted
by Eysenbach (2001)
Further studies should be carried out in other
parts of the country (Nigeria) and other parts of
the world to establish young people’s use of e-
health resources
Better qualified healthcare givers should
provide health information online rather than
amateurs. Because the internet is a gateless
medium, qualified health personnel should
endeavor to develop blogs and websites with
health resources that young people can easily
access.
REFERENCES
Berry, D., 2007, Health Communication: theory and
practice, Open University Press, McGraw-Hill, United
States.
Department of Health (United States), 2004, Better
Information, Better Choices, Better Health: Putting
Information at the Centre of Care. Pg. 2.
Eysenbach G., 2001, what is e-health? published on the
Journal of Medical Internet research, Vol. 3 (2) April –
June 2001.
Green, L., 2010, The internet: an introduction to the new
media. Berg Publishers, New York.
Hargie, O. and Dickson, D., 2004, Skilled Interpersonal
Communication: Research, Theory and Practice.
Hove: Brunner Routledge.
Institute of medicine of the National academies., 2002,
Speaking of Health: assessing health communication
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Mattelart, A., 2003, The Information Society: An
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Pettigrew, L.S. and Logan, R., 1987, The health care
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Schofield, T., 2004, Introduction, in E. MacDonald (ed.),
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