Convergence of eHealth and Health 2.0?
September 15, 2009
While some create strong distinctions between the terms eHealth and Health 2.0, others use them interchangeably. eHealth clearly came before Health 2.0 but is it just an evolution from one to the other. The general consensus seems to be that ehealth is a broad term including electronic medical records, personal health records and other health care tools. Some include mobile devices, home monitoring and telemedicine within ehealth. Health 2.0 evolved more recently and focuses on Web 2.0 tools especially social media tools and their use in health care.
Are they converging or is there an opportunity for convergence? They need to converge because in the future ePatients will demand a single view of their health both from PHRs and social media. Perhaps it will look something like Google Wave.
