CHIME News
- BMJ Editorial: Caldicott 2 and Patient Data
- "Patient Safety, Law Policy and Practice" Published in Paperback
- UCL Joins the European Connected Health Alliance
- UCL CHIME is Early Contributor to New Health Informatics Online Resource
- Professor Dipak Kalra takes up Presidency of the EuroRec Institute
- 2012 European Summit on Trustworthy Reuse of Health Data – plenary sessions now available on YouTube
- "Patient Safety, Law Policy and Practice"
- Ethnicity and academic performance in medicine
- Uptake of flu vaccine among healthcare workers
- Open Source, Open Standards, and Health Care Information Systems
- howRU, a new short generic measure of health status
- Dr Don E. Detmer honoured by American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA)
- Public 'reassured' by swine flu media coverage
- Key NHS IT Programmes – UCL report
- UKHIT online - Computers and the Internet
- Group membership and staff turnover affect outcomes in group CBT for persistent pain
- Electronic patient records are not a panacea
- Using computerised CBT to prevent mental health problems: a systematic review and a case study of Xanthis
- New Students Begin UCL Postgraduate Programme in Health Informatics
- CHIME researcher contributes to new book
Public 'reassured' by swine flu media coverage
23 July 2010
The swine flu (influenza A H1N1v) pandemic of 2009
created considerable media coverage and some degree of public anxiety.
Until a vaccine was developed, behavioural strategies by the general
public were the main defence against further spread, so it was
important that the public were well-informed about the pandemic and
what they could do. Much concern was expressed at the time about the
media, and indeed the Government, possibly sensationalising what was
happening.
However, a new UCL study suggests that media coverage
and advertising broadly reduced public concern at an individual level
and improved the uptake of useful behaviours. The study was funded by a
NHS National Institute for Health Research grant to Prof. Susan Michie
(Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology) and CHIME's own Dr Henry Potts. It is published today in Health Technology Assessment.
Based on a series of 36 telephone surveys of the general public, the research found that, generally, the public showed low levels of behaviour change, a concern for the future if more serious pandemics follow. For example, only 56% of the public said they would have the swine flu vaccine if offered it. They were more likely to accept it if they were worried about the possibility of themselves or their child catching swine flu.
Rubin GJ, Potts HWW, Michie S (2010). The impact of communications about swine flu (influenza A H1N1v) on public responses to the outbreak: Results from 36 national telephone surveys in the UK. Health Technology Assessment, 14(34), 183-266. doi: 10.3310/hta14340-03 Full-text available free Contact: Henry Potts
Links: Health Technology Assessment pandemic flu themed issue, Full UCL News story
