Analysis of the Health Information Needs of Diabetics in China

According to the latest statistics of the China National Health Protection Commission, the prevalence of adult diabetics in China has reached 11.6%, and the number of patients has exceeded 114 million. Understanding the needs of diabetics and what kind of problems they are anxious about are crucial for doctors, hospitals and other health care providers, which can be used to ameliorate patient education services and help patients to improve their disease management skills. Hence we have conducted a study to analyze the questions about diabetes collected from a Chinese health website; the number of which is 151,589. We have divided these questions into 9 categories using a convolutional neural network. The shocking results showed that the questions about prevention only account for 1.23%. And a Chinese patented drug Xiaoke pill, the main component of which is glibenclamide, ranks fourth among the drugs the user cares most about due to the cheap price. However, patients know very little about its side effects.