e-Health

First introduced by medical industry leaders and marketers, the term e-health has been used to convey the optimistic promise of using Internet-related technology to improve health. There remains a great deal of ambiguity with regard to what e-health means. Part of the uncertainty in finding a precise definition lies in the word health, which generally refers to an outcome rather than a specific object or activity. According to the World Health Organization (1948), “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (p. 1). The term e-health does not lend itself to a common definition, and scholars have liberally defined it in a variety of ways specific to the function that the term serves ...