TY  - JOUR
AU  - Shaffer, Kelly M
AU  - Chow, Philip I
AU  - Cohn, Wendy F
AU  - Ingersoll, Karen S
AU  - Ritterband, Lee M
PY  - 2018
DA  - 2018/12/18
TI  - Informal Caregivers’ Use of Internet-Based Health Resources: An Analysis of the Health Information National Trends Survey
JO  - JMIR Aging
SP  - e11051
VL  - 1
IS  - 2
KW  - caregivers
KW  - health education
KW  - internet
KW  - information dissemination
KW  - mobile phone
KW  - uncompensated care
AB  - Background: Informal caregivers express strong interest in technology innovations to help them in their caregiving role; however, divides across sociodemographic characteristics in internet and technology access may preclude the most vulnerable caregivers from accessing such resources. Objective: This study aims to examine caregivers’ internet use, both generally and for seeking health-related information, and whether usage differs as a function of caregivers’ characteristics. Methods: Data were analyzed from the Health Information National Trends Survey 5 Cycle 1. Participants were included in analyses if they self-identified as providing uncompensated care to a close individual. Caregivers reported internet use factors, age, education, rurality, general health, distress, and objective caregiving burden. We used chi-square tests of independence with jackknife variance estimation to compare whether internet use factors differed by caregivers’ characteristics. Results: A total of 77.5% (303/391) caregivers surveyed reported ever using the internet. Of internet users, 88.1% (267/303) accessed from a home computer and 83.2% (252/303) from a mobile device. Most caregivers accessed health information for themselves (286/391, 73.1%) or others (264/391, 67.5%); fewer communicated with a doctor over the Web (148/391, 37.9%) or had a wellness app (171/391, 43.7%). Caregivers reporting younger age, more education, and good health were more likely to endorse any of these activities. Furthermore, two-thirds of caregivers (258/391, 66.0%) endorsed trust in health information from the internet. Conclusions: Computers and mobile devices are practical platforms for disseminating caregiving-related information and supportive services to informal caregivers; these modalities may, however, have a more limited reach to caregivers who are older, have less education, and are in poorer health. 
SN  - 2561-7605
UR  - http://aging.jmir.org/2018/2/e11051/
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2196/11051
UR  - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31518244
DO  - 10.2196/11051
ID  - info:doi/10.2196/11051
ER  -