Patients are not simply health IT users or consumers: The case for "e-healthicant" applications

Abstract

Health IT applications today generally incorporate patients as passive users or consumers of information rather than active individuals w ho, in concert with their providers, are motivated and jointly responsible for their ow n good health. This article uses the healthcare value chain concept [Porter and Teisberg, 2006] as a framework to identify gaps in patient-centered e-health applications. While patient diversity poses challenges similar to consumer diversity for application design, consumer-centric design is limiting for patient-centered e-health because patients should not simply consume health care; they need to interact at multiple stages, alter their behaviors, and actively participate. This article raises critical research questions specif ic to this challenge. It def ines a new term, "healthicant," to motivate a research focus on technology-enabled applications that support individuals responsible for their ow n health and well-being, and w ho seek appropriate assistance as needed to prevent, diagnose, prepare, intervene, rehabilitate, monitor, and manage their health throughout their lifetime. The article contrasts the objectives of healthicants with both healthcare providers (for w hom most health IT has been created) and more passive patients (for w hom current "patient-centered" applications are evolving), in order to identif y important gaps today. These include systems that support healthicant motivation, measurement, analysis, data mining, real-time personalized feedback, and multidirectional communication. © 2014 by the Association for Information Systems.