School of Population Health, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
School of Population Health, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia, Australia; Medical School, The University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
Int J Med Inform. 2022 Aug;164:104803. doi: 10.1016/j.ijmedinf.2022.104803. Epub 2022 May 24.
Australia has seen a rapid uptake of virtual care since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. We aimed to describe the willingness of consumers to use digital technology for health and to share their health information; and explore differences by educational attainment and area of remoteness.
We conducted an online survey on consumer preferences for virtual modes of healthcare delivery between June and September 2021. Participants were recruited through the study's partner organisations and an online market research company. Australian residents aged ≥18 years who provided study consent and completed the survey were included in the analysis. We reported the weighted percentages of participants who selected negative response to the questions to understand the size of the population that were unlikely to adopt virtual care. Age-adjusted Poisson regression models were used to estimate the prevalence ratios for selecting negative response associated with education and remoteness.
Of the 1778 participants included, 29% were not aware of digital technologies for monitoring/supporting health, 22% did not have access to technologies to support their health, and 19% were not willing to use technologies for health. Over a fifth of participants (range: 21-34%) were not at all willing to use seven of the 15 proposed alternative methods of care. Between 21% and 36% of participants were not at all willing to share de-identified health information tracked in apps/devices with various not-for-profit organisations compared to 47% with private/for-profit health businesses. Higher proportions of participants selected negative response to the questions in the lower educational attainment groups than those with bachelor's degree or above. No difference was observed between area of remoteness.
Improving the digital health literacy of people, especially those with lower educational attainment, will be required for virtual care to become an equitable part of normal healthcare delivery in Australia.
自 COVID-19 大流行开始以来，澳大利亚迅速采用了虚拟护理。我们旨在描述消费者使用数字技术进行健康管理的意愿并分享他们的健康信息；并探讨教育程度和偏远地区差异的影响。
我们在 2021 年 6 月至 9 月期间进行了一项关于消费者对虚拟医疗服务模式偏好的在线调查。参与者通过研究合作伙伴组织和在线市场研究公司招募。年龄≥18 岁的澳大利亚居民在提供研究同意书并完成调查后被纳入分析。我们报告了对问题选择否定回答的参与者的加权百分比，以了解不太可能采用虚拟护理的人群规模。使用年龄调整后的泊松回归模型估计与教育和偏远程度相关的选择否定回答的患病率比。
在纳入的 1778 名参与者中，29%的人不知道用于监测/支持健康的数字技术，22%的人无法获得支持其健康的技术，19%的人不愿意使用技术进行健康管理。超过五分之一的参与者（范围：21-34%）完全不愿意使用 15 种拟议替代护理方法中的七种。与私营/营利性健康企业相比，有 21%-36%的参与者完全不愿意与各种非营利组织共享在应用程序/设备中跟踪的去识别健康信息，而有 47%的参与者愿意。在教育程度较低的群体中，对问题选择否定回答的比例高于具有学士学位或以上的群体。在偏远地区之间没有观察到差异。
需要提高人们的数字健康素养，尤其是那些教育程度较低的人，以便虚拟护理成为澳大利亚常规医疗服务的公平组成部分。
