Finnish Medicines Agency Fimea, P.O. Box 55, 00034 Fimea, Kuopio, Finland.
Division of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy, Faculty of Pharmacy, P.O. Box 56, 00014, University of Helsinki, Finland.
Res Social Adm Pharm. 2018 Aug;14(8):758-764. doi: 10.1016/j.sapharm.2017.09.007. Epub 2017 Sep 30.
The internet is widely and increasingly used to search for health information. Previous studies have focused mainly on health information on the internet and not specifically on medicines information (MI).
The aim of this study was to explore the internet as a source of MI compared to other sources of MI; to identify those who use the internet as a source of MI; and to describe patterns of use of the internet as a source of MI.
A cross-sectional design employed a web-based questionnaire posted by patients' and other organizations as well as pharmacies on their websites during six weeks in the beginning of 2014. Logistic regression analysis was used to assess associations of background variables to the use of different MI sources.
The most frequently used MI sources among respondents (n = 2489) were package leaflets (90%), pharmacists (83%), physicians (72%), and the internet (68%). According to a multivariate analysis, internet use for MI was associated with female gender, age <65 years, higher education, daily use of the internet, and continuous use of vitamins or herbals. MI was most commonly searched from a Finnish health portal (56%) and websites of pharmacies (41%). Of the respondents, nearly half (43%) used search engines to find information from the internet. The names of the medicinal product, symptom or disease were the most commonly used search terms.
Well-educated, young women tend to search MI on the internet. Health care professionals should discuss reliable MI websites and tools that can help patients evaluate the reliability of information.
互联网被广泛且日益多地用于搜索健康信息。之前的研究主要集中在互联网上的健康信息，而不是专门针对药品信息（MI）。
本研究旨在探索互联网作为 MI 来源与其他 MI 来源的比较；确定那些将互联网用作 MI 来源的人群；并描述将互联网用作 MI 来源的使用模式。
采用横断面设计，在 2014 年初的六周内，通过患者和其他组织以及药店在其网站上发布的基于网络的问卷进行。使用逻辑回归分析评估背景变量与使用不同 MI 来源之间的关联。
在受访者（n=2489）中，最常使用的 MI 来源是药品说明书（90%）、药剂师（83%）、医生（72%）和互联网（68%）。根据多变量分析，互联网用于 MI 与女性、年龄<65 岁、高教育程度、每天使用互联网以及持续使用维生素或草药有关。MI 最常从芬兰健康门户网站（56%）和药店网站（41%）上搜索。在受访者中，近一半（43%）使用搜索引擎从互联网上查找信息。药品名称、症状或疾病是最常用的搜索词。
受过良好教育、年轻的女性往往会在互联网上搜索 MI。医疗保健专业人员应讨论可靠的 MI 网站和工具，以帮助患者评估信息的可靠性。
