Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of British Columbia, 2405 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z3, Canada.
Collaboration for Outcomes Research and Evaluation, 2405 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z3, Canada.
Support Care Cancer. 2020 Dec;28(12):6011-6021. doi: 10.1007/s00520-020-05446-5. Epub 2020 Apr 15.
Our objective was to evaluate health information seeking behaviors in yCRC (young onset colorectal cancer, diagnosed ≤ 50 years) and aCRC (average-age onset colorectal cancer, diagnosed ≥ 50 years).
We administered an international, Internet-based survey to ask individuals diagnosed with CRC how they seek health information, including sources sought and utilization behaviors. We also asked participants their preferences for digital technologies.
In total 1125 individuals including 455 with yCRC (68.6% female) and 670 with aCRC (53.5% female) participated. There were similar frequencies of seeking among participants with yCRC and aCRC across all sources except for the Internet. Healthcare providers were the most frequently sought source with similar proportions of participants indicating their response as "always" (yCRC, 43.7% vs. aCRC, 43.2%, p = 0.91). We also observed differences in utilization behaviors with more participants with yCRC using the Internet first when seeking information (yCRC 31.6% vs. aCRC 24.3%, p < 0.05) and those with aCRC seeking healthcare providers first (aCRC 61.9% vs. yCRC 45.5%, p < 0.05). With respect to digital technologies, we found a higher proportion of yCRC participants owning smartphones and indicating use of apps related to health/wellness and cancer.
Individuals with yCRC and aCRC similarly sought the same resources for health information on CRC. However, they differed with respect to utilization behaviors, particularly a greater reliance on digital technologies among individuals with yCRC. These have implications for informing age-specific resources and information to support patients.
本研究旨在评估早发性结直肠癌（yCRC，诊断年龄≤50 岁）和一般发病年龄结直肠癌（aCRC，诊断年龄≥50 岁）患者的健康信息寻求行为。
我们采用国际互联网调查的方式，询问诊断为结直肠癌的个体如何寻求健康信息，包括寻求的信息来源和使用行为。我们还询问了参与者对数字技术的偏好。
共有 1125 名参与者，包括 455 名 yCRC（68.6%为女性）和 670 名 aCRC（53.5%为女性）。除互联网外，yCRC 和 aCRC 患者在所有来源的寻求信息频率相似。医疗保健提供者是最常被寻求的信息来源，有相似比例的参与者表示他们的反应是“总是”（yCRC，43.7%与 aCRC，43.2%，p=0.91）。我们还观察到使用行为的差异，更多的 yCRC 患者在寻求信息时首先使用互联网（yCRC，31.6%与 aCRC，24.3%，p<0.05），而 aCRC 患者则首先寻求医疗保健提供者（aCRC，61.9%与 yCRC，45.5%，p<0.05）。关于数字技术，我们发现 yCRC 参与者拥有智能手机的比例较高，并表示使用与健康/保健和癌症相关的应用程序。
yCRC 和 aCRC 患者在寻求 CRC 健康信息时同样寻求相同的资源。然而，他们在使用行为上存在差异，尤其是 yCRC 患者更依赖数字技术。这对提供特定于年龄的资源和信息以支持患者具有重要意义。
