Patient Centered Healthcare Informatics

 Abstract—The healthcare system is undergoing a transformation from reactive care to proactive and preventive care. Patients or health consumers are actively acquiring knowledge to manage their health and seeking supports from their peers in addition to receiving healthcare support from healthcare professionals. 74% of American adults use the internet, of which 80% have looked online for healthcare information [6]. With the popularity of social media, many health consumers are also exchanging informational and emotional support with peers who have similar health conditions or diseases. The large volume of health consumer contributed content provides valuable resources for healthcare informatics research. It is worth to note that the information in the health consumer contributed content is timelier than the traditional resources such as electronic health records, centralized reporting systems, and pharmaceutical databases because health consumers often discuss their concerns with peers before any of them are reported in the traditional resources [22]. In this article, we review a few important healthcare informatics research issues that are centered on the patient contributed content and concerns.