What is Information Therapy?
The most common complaint patients have about doctors is that they don’t communicate properly. They either don’t have the time or they use medical jargon with the results that patients don’t understand what’s exactly happening to them. Today, most doctors do not spend enough time talking to their patients leading to a further widening of the doctor-patient communication gap. That’s where judicious use of Information Therapy can play a role. Just like medication, health information can be prescribed by a health care provider. Information therapy is the prescription of evidence-based medical information to a specific patient, caregiver, or consumer at just the right time to help the person make a specific health decision or behaviour change. When information therapy is prescribed as a part of health care, it can be as important as any test, surgery or medicine.

How relevant is Information Therapy in the Indian context?
Indian patients are becoming increasingly involved in their own healthcare. Every patient wants to know what his options are. The use of this therapy makes it easy to source information that people want. The transition will come soon in India too. Do you see Information Therapy as a possible substitute for a doctor’s counselling? Information Therapy cannot be a substitute but will definitely supplement a doctor’s counselling. Studies show that patients forget over half of what the doctor tells them because of the stress of consultation. Giving them printed educational material to read at home will help them remember as well as ensure patient compliance, as the printed word is often useful in reinforcing medical advice and instructions.

Individuals who make good health decisions have better health and lower health care costs. In the future, prescriptions of evidence-based medical information are slated to become an essential part of every medical encounter. Overall, Information Therapy can help reduce medical errors and health care costs-and can help you receive better care. Information therapy is powerful medicine. How important is knowledge about his condition to a patient and to what extent should it be imparted to him? Information therapy changes the way health care is delivered. By getting information prescriptions, patients and doctors are better able to communicate, especially when time is limited. A patient is the custodian of his own health and has right to know more about his diagnosis and treatment options.

Should the onus of imparting health education lie on the doctors or should it be other healthcare workers?
A patient has to be a partner in health education along with a gamut of healthcare providers including the doctors, paramedics, nurses, pharmacists as well as health insurers. In today’s age, people increasingly suffer from chronic illnesses like diabetes, heart, cancer etc. In such a scenario, what a patient does for himself even in terms of food and exercise affects his quality of health. How has this been implemented in the US? Some leading organisations like the Kaiser Permanente’s Care Management Institute, California and Palo Alto Medical Foundation, Los Angeles have implemented Information Therapy programmes.These are becoming increasingly popular even with individual doctors. Unlike free-floating health content on the Web, information therapy prescriptions are delivered to the patient as part of the process of care, with only the information relevant to his or her current moment in care. Correctly prescribed, information becomes medicinepowerful medicine.