Welcome

The field of health information encompasses behaviors of both providers and users, but it is the information-seeking behaviors of the user that we will be focusing on this week, specifically: adolescents, cancer patients, and persons suffering from mental illness. There are many factors that affect how a patient seeks information about his or her health, and they encompass physical, emotional, and mental concerns. Ormandy suggests that patient needs are the “recognition that their knowledge is inadequate to satisfy a goal, within the context/situation that they find themselves at a specific point in the time” (92). As information professionals, what can we do to bridge that knowledge gap? How do we recognize the how, what, and why of patient information seeking? These are questions we hope you ponder as you approach this week’s readings and presentation.