Patient activation and use of an electronic patient portal

Abstract

Primary objective: Electronic patient portals give patients access to personal medical data, potentially creating opportunities to improve knowledge, self-efficacy, and engagement in healthcare. The combination of knowledge, self-efficacy, and engagement has been termed activation. Our objective was to assess the relationship between patient activation and outpatient use of a patient portal.

Research design: Survey.

Methods and procedures: A telephone survey was conducted with 180 patients who had been given access to a portal, 113 of whom used it and 67 of whom did not. The validated patient activation measure (PAM) was administered along with questions about demographics and behaviors.

Results: Portal users were no different from nonusers in patient activation. Portal users did have higher education level and more frequent Internet use, and were more likely to have precisely 2 prescription medications than to have more or fewer.

Conclusion: Patients who chose to use an electronic patient portal were not more highly activated than nonusers, although they were more educated and more likely to be Internet users.

Keywords: Consumer informatics; electronic health records; patient activation; patient engagement; personal health records; survey research.