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In 2000, the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that 25% of Americans searched online for health information.  Today, 61% rely on the Web for medical and health content.  Americans' growing reliance on Dr. Google and Nurse Yahoo! has led to profound changes in how health organizations and providers relate to and communicate with consumers. 

Taking the lead from the late physician, author, and researcher Tom Ferguson, the Pew Project's Susannah Fox began calling online health seekers, "e-patients" to illustrate how the Internet has empowered these individuals to better manage their (and others' care).  While there is some controversy surrounding the term, e-patients has firmly entered the lexicon.  According to Google, there were more than 21 million references to e-patients across the Web as of October 28, 2010.

Since 2000, research on e-patients' media consumption behaviors and preferences has exploded.  To help health communicators and others make sense of the latest e-patient-related data, the Path of the Blue Eye Project published the first comprehensive infographic on their information seeking habits in late October 2010 (see below).

Notably, this infographic provides information on e-patient social media communications from a Project-produced research report, "Communicating with the Empowered E-Patient."  Individuals making regular contributions to the Project's knowledge community, Living the Path can download the full text of the report.  Learn more about how to download the report here.  Others, view the full text below.

For information regarding the data sources used to develop this infographic please see the "Additional Resources" section below. (Please note: Data in the infographic focuses on the U.S. population.