The recent national survey conducted by the Internet & American Life Project of the Pew Research Center provides some interesting insights for healthcare marketers. The survey was carried out across the country by Princeton Survey Research Associates International. A total number of 3,014 adults living in the U.S. were interviewed over a period of one month between August and September last year. The study received support from the California Healthcare Foundation, an independent nonprofit committed to improving healthcare in the state.

According to the survey findings, 81 percent of American adults are Internet users, and out of them 59 percent have searched for health information over the Internet during the last one year. 35 percent of American adults reported that they had searched the Internet to understand the medical condition of their own or someone known to them. 46 percent of these people who specifically tried to diagnose a medical condition online were influenced by the Internet to consider receiving professional medical help.

Younger adults, women, white adults, and adults having annual household income higher than $75,000 were more likely search online for a possible medical diagnosis. These findings tend to indicate a growing dependence on the Internet to look for highly specific health information. For many Internet users, the Internet is serving as a personal health tool to some extent. Medical professionals, online marketers and healthcare website developers can do better if they try to fulfill this growing need of people by providing them more specific, in-depth and advanced health information online.

It is quite evident from the survey findings that the average readers have higher expectations from a healthcare website in terms of quality of content. Medical sites that emphasize on providing the best possible information and addressing the search queries of the maximum number of visitors in a satisfactory manner are likely to outperform sites with thin or vague content.