The mechanism of patient knowledge empowerment through digital health communities

Abstract

medical innovations created and developed in the context of digital transformation have already led to better public health, including hygiene, prevention of infectious diseases, and accurate diagnosis. Despite the wide scale of medical innovation and the activity of researchers, inventors, and developers of effective medical solutions, the number of people with chronic diseases has been constantly growing, and this is a challenge for health systems around the world. A key requirement for patients to be able to self-manage their disease is patient empowerment. People become empowered to independently take decisions to manage the disease as well as to be in charge of it, mainly when they possess knowledge about their illness and can employ it in making such decisions. One of the vital steps for successful patient empowerment to manage their chronic disease is the possibility to access virtual communities of patients and to engage in their activities.The field of research on digital health communities is characterized by the research gap: patient health communities are not seen as enabling patient knowledge to self-manage their disease; therefore, the approach that patient health communities do not operate in isolation from the patient empowerment process, but are part of that process that encourages patients to evolve to the highest level of empowerment is not being developed. Motivators, barriers, and enablers of knowledge sharing specific to patient knowledge empowerment through digital communities are also not explored. Failure to disclose these aspects does not allow for understanding the patient knowledge empowerment through digital health communities. As a result of scientific literature analysis, a holistic model is presented that reveals what knowledge sharing motivators and enablers operate at each level of patient empowerment.