Explaining variation in health information seeking behaviour - Insights from a multilingual survey

How best to provide an increasingly diverse population with health information has become a major concern for health policy makers in Europe and beyond. Our study aims to investigate factors explaining variation in people's health information seeking behaviour. Our findings can be used to identify target groups for policy interventions that aim to provide health information efficiently.

Cross-sectional, paper-based, multilingual survey of a random sample of enrolees of two statutory health insurers in Hamburg, Germany. Data were collected from September to December 2017. Multivariable logistic regression was used to examine sociodemographic and health-related individual characteristics and their associations with participants' choice of ten sources of health information.

Participants' choice of information sources differed significantly across the following sociodemographic and health-related characteristics: age, gender, immigration status, education, employment status, marital status and general state of health. Immigrants and individuals with low educational attainment were most likely to use emergency departments as sources of health information.

Policy interventions aiming to manage the use of health information sources should focus on immigrants and individuals with low educational attainment. Providing multilingual, low-threshold counselling and information services could be an efficient way to reduce short-term costs of health information seeking behaviour to health insurers or other payers of care while improving patient empowerment.