Healthy Skepticism Library item: 16301

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: news

Study: 3 out of 4 U.S. Nurses Recommend Health Websites to Patients
PharmaLive 2009 Aug 24
http://pharmalive.com/news/index.cfm?articleID=647242

Abstract:

Manhattan Research Releases New Taking the Pulse® U.S. Nurses Study Giving Insight to How Nurses Use Technology

Full text:

Approximately three out of four U.S. nurses recommend health websites to patients, according to the inaugural Taking the Pulse® Nurses v9.0 study from healthcare and pharmaceutical market research company Manhattan Research. The market research and advisory service focuses on which technologies nurses have adopted, how they are currently using them, and how they plan to use them in the future.

The study found that nurses are very savvy when it comes to using technology for health. The average nurse spends eight hours per week online for professional purposes, which is just as much time as physicians, and almost all of them use the Internet in between patient consultations. Nurses are also proactive in researching medical product information specifically online – over eighty percent have visited a pharma, biotech, or device company website in the past year. Merck, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, and Sanofi-Aventis have the most-visited corporate sites by nurses.

“While marketers have known for some time that nurses shape patients’ health decisions, they haven’t found effective ways to leverage this relationship. This study unequivocally shows that the Internet offers many strong opportunities for marketers to connect with and influence nurses,” said Monique Levy, Senior Director of Research at Manhattan Research. “This is great news for marketers, who are struggling to reach and maintain physician mindshare. They have another way into the office.”