Analysis of Interactive E-Health Tools on United Arab Emirates Patient Visited Hospital Websites

OBJECTIVES: This study is to scrutinize the website of Seoul National University Hospital in Korea, Clinique Valmont in Switzerland, Medical Center of the University of Munich in Germany, Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to suggest successful communication factors to the medical service providers who deal with Middle Eastern patients. METHODS: Using content analysis and in-depth interviews, this research examines four hospitals commonly visited by Middle East patients. The four hospitals approaches to implementing interactive e-health tools on their web sites are reviewed. Four hospitals selection criterion was process by focus group interview of government officials in UAE health sectors. RESULTS: The way of providing medical information differed by hospitals that used e-health tools. The analysis of each website shows a different way providing medical information, services and education. There are important differences among hospitals. These include decision-making, planning processes and outcomes of implementing e-health tools online, as well as potential obstacles to such implementation. Thus, hospitals can learn and design effective interactive tools by applying e-health tools on their websites. CONCLUSIONS: Each website showed different interactive tools such as traditional functional tools, core e-business tools, patient support tools, visitor related tools, emerging functional tools. By applying the interactive e-health tools sets an objective view for e-health strategy and vision for the hospitals conveying information through the website. According to the type of hospitals and its location different methods of strategy should be applied. Targeting not only the patients but also the general website users will eventually improve health information accessibility.