Q1) How have the growing popularity of internet and new social media technologies challenge the sick role theory?
Nowadays, with the rapid development of technology, the popularity of the internet and new social media technologies have grown tremendously, which changes habits and the lifestyle of people a lot. Accordingly, the growing popularity of this kind of technologies has definitely challenged the sick role theory to a certain extent.
To begin with, in the sick role theory, it assumes that doctors should work their utmost in the interest of patients and the community instead of their own interest that those patients should always be put into the first position. What is more is that the sick role theory also assumes that the patients should seek help from the professionalists rather than on their own that they should be on the same page with the doctors. Moreover, it is expected that there should be an amiable, peaceful relationship between the doctors and patients that they get along well with each other. More importantly, doctors, in this theory, are expected to be universal beneficiary while patients should take their responsibility to do their utmost to maintain their good health, not to mention that doctors play a role of gatekeeper to most of the health resources and patients are expected to be passive in the character.
There are some health-related websites or pages for the focus of the study. The first website is 快速問醫生-有問必答, which is mainly for people who have a concern of their own body that they can ask questions online to the registered doctors. The health is considered a normal condition and is so vital that everyone should have. On the contrary, sickness is regarded as an abnormal condition of the body or even deviance that everyone should try their best to get rid of sickness with the help of doctors to recover and maintain a healthy body. For the funder of this website, 珠海健康云科技有限公司 is funding this website. Regarding the health belief of this website, not only is health regarded as a functional capacity as well as the emotional well-being, but also a reflecting lifestyle that people should have healthy behaviour, which is not having excessive alcohol intake or smoking. As for the social value embedded in this website, the social value is that people nowadays do not necessarily need to go out to see a doctor, instead, they can just ‘see’ doctors at home by surfing the Internet. Incontestably, this kind of health-related website has definitely affected the behaviour of patients. After the emergence of this website, people will not go out to see a doctor, they, however, will surf the Internet and choose to express their concern about their health condition and describe those symptoms of the sickness online and wait for the response of the doctors. Furthermore, there are so many similar cases online. Next time when they have some sickness, they will take the initiative to search on the website and take the reference of those similar cases that they have a grasp of what is going on in their body.
The other two Facebook pages are LIFELOVEL and healthlifenews. LIFELOVEL is mainly in the Chinese context and both Facebook pages focus on some life hacks that can improve the health. For the LIFELOVEL, health is regarded as the balance of Yin and Yang as well as the circulation of Qi which is the flow of energy in the body and sickness is regarded as the insufficiency of Qi and imbalance of Yin and Yang. As for the healthlifenews, health is regarded as having a healthy lifestyle and the functional body while sickness is considered the dysfunction of the body. The social values of these two Facebook pages are that they suggest we can prevent our illness only by changing some habits in our daily life and prevention is much better than cure. Beyond doubt, this type of health-related Facebook pages has affected the behaviour of the patients as well. The patients will be more aware of their lifestyle from now on and develop a different lifestyle according to the information on those Facebook pages, like drinking water at a certain time can improve the health that this can help to detox from the body system. (Ho (2017). 每日健康 Health. Retrieved November 24, 2017 from http://healthylives.tw/article/C9EwgzMBgJi.html) People will even rely on the methods provided on the Facebook page to cure their sickness. (我的健康生活 (2017). Retrieved November 25, 2017 from https://www.facebook.com/LIFELOVEL/photos/a.827394733988892.1073741828.814609808600718/1623291721065852/?type=3&theater )
Apparently, these pieces of evidence have challenged the sick role theory. Patients have been expected to be passive in the sick role theory that they are recipient in the relationship between the doctors and patients. Yet, it has proven that patients are not passive anymore. With the development of the Internet and social media sites, they will search on the Internet for their sickness actively or will even ask the doctors for their body conditions in a pursuit of a better understanding of their body. Aside from this, some people will not seek help from the professionalists, instead, they will rely on the information of some Facebook pages to cure their sickness, which has definitely challenged the sick role theory as well.
Regarding the reasons for people choosing to use this kind of websites rather than going to see a doctor, the reasons are actually quite simple. The very first reason why people would rather surf the internet is convenience. As everyone knows, Hong Kong is such a fast-paced and hectic city, people in Hong Kong is so busy with their work that they cannot even spare time for seeing a doctor when they feel sick or they are so buried in their work that they are reluctant to put aside their work lest they should become a burden to their colleagues, thereby preferring surfing the Internet to find solutions of their sickness to going to see a doctor in person. What is more is that most of the time in Hong Kong, if people want to see a doctor, they have to line up and wait for a long period of time even if they have made a registration in advance. Seeing a doctor is so inconvenient that people would rather surf the Internet.
The second reason is that surfing the Internet is so much cheaper than seeing a doctor. As a matter of fact, seeing doctors nowadays cost at least $250, on the contrary, search for the information on the Internet is completely free of charge, even asking questions to doctors online is much cheaper than going out to see a doctor at a clinic. Therefore, this is another reason of why people prefer surfing the Internet.
The third reason is that people possibly find that surfing the Internet is much more comfortable than seeing a doctor face to face. Most of the time when we are seeing a doctor, we have to wait for a long time. And when we can finally meet the doctor and describe our symptoms to him, there is basically no time for us to ask questions regarding the details of our sickness so as to have a better understanding of our sickness or why we suffer from it as outside there are still a lot of patients who are same as us waiting for seeing a doctor. The process is so short that we will feel the intangible pressure from the doctor, it is like telling us to hurry up so that he can meet the next patient as soon as possible. We will feel so nervous or even stressed out in the process compared to surfing the Internet or asking questions to doctors online, which is obviously much comfortable and relaxing.
For the people who like using these websites instead of going to a doctor, those people are very likely to be teenagers, workers as well as the lower-class people. For teenagers, they are with their smartphones whenever we see them. They are the generation that is most familiar with the popular trend of the internet and new media technologies, like Facebook that they usually surf them compared to other generations. More importantly, they are in the period of learning that they are full of curiosity with everything happening around the world. They are so familiar with the new technologies that they keen on using the internet to search everything. Even when they are sick, they will still describe their symptoms on the internet to know what is going on in their body. Apart from teenagers, workers are likely to use this kind of websites as well. It is a well-known fact that Hong Kong is such a competitive city that most workers in Hong Kong have to work around the clock to earn their living. When they are sick, they cannot spare time to go to a doctor that they have no choice but to search their symptoms on the internet as seeing a doctor is so time-consuming. Even if they really want to see a doctor so bad, when they finish their work, the clinic has already closed. That is the reason why workers are likely to utilise these websites. What is more is that those lower-class people are likely to use these websites as well. Lower-class people are those who have a poor economic ability that they cannot afford to see a doctor as it is too expensive for them. Of course they can go to the government hospital, it, however, takes at least 4 hours as there are so many people lining up to see a doctor and some lower-class people have to go to work that they cannot spend so much time in waiting, thus they would rather search on the internet or ask doctors questions online.
In nowadays society, what people act has certainly challenged the sick role theory. To start with, the act of people searching on the internet regarding their sickness has challenged the sick role theory. When people have a sickness, they will no longer seek help from the professionalists because of plenty of reasons, instead, they would rather search on the internet on their own to find some references that can be referred to their own sickness to cure the symptoms, which has challenged the sick role theory. What is more is that they no longer adopt a passive attitude when it comes to having a sickness. They will take the initiative to search on the internet to find the solutions for their sickness, trying to work things out and some of they will even ask doctors for their opinions or questions online actively. Apparently, this kind of behaviour has challenged the sick role theory beyond doubt. More importantly, in this theory, patients should try their best to get well in order to strive for a good health. Nevertheless, take the workers and those low-class people as an example, health is not the thing they most concern, but their working ability as well as the cost of going to a doctor. As for the role of doctors, it has challenged the sick role theory as well. Doctors are not really universal beneficiary that they do not really work for the sake of patients. Instead, they work mainly for their interest, as we can see that they make the patients wait for a long period of time. Moreover, doctors are no longer the gatekeeper of most of the health resources since nowadays patients will access it through the internet. These few things have challenged the sick role theory again.
All in all, the growing popularity of the internet and the new social media technologies has challenged the doctor-patient relationship to a great extent. These changes have both advantages and disadvantages. The first advantage is that for those lower-class people, they cannot afford to see a doctor owing to their poor economic ability, but through the emergence of the internet, they can access the health resources themselves, like buying the medicine in the pharmacy to soothe their symptoms of their sickness. Furthermore, patients will not be afraid of asking questions to doctors in face to face as they now can ask for doctors’ opinions on the website that the embarrassment fades away and through this, it is believed that they can get a better understanding of their body since they have nothing to be afraid of. Of course, patients will be more aware of their own health as well as the health-related information on the Facebook pages can work as a frequent reminder to remind people to pay attention to their health and prevent them from getting any sickness, longing for reducing the pressure of healthcare system in Hong Kong in long term. As for the disadvantages of these changes, as the internet is flooded with a multitude of false information, it may mislead the people or will even aggravate their symptoms of the sickness. In light of this, people should visit some authorised websites lest they put their health in jeopardy.