A few weeks ago my wife comes to me with a flash light, opens her mouth, and says: “Do I have something in my throat, it itches, I feel like I am getting sick”.  I gave a quick look, noticed some spots - as usual my words did not seem to mean much…she went to the bathroom mirror to look for herself.  The next thing I hear is feverish typing, some mouse clicks, and then the aha moment: “I have strep throat”…a simple search on WebMD - white spots on throat produces over 60 results of which most are related to strep throat.  Then she makes an appointment with her doctor to get antibiotics.  She is what Mark Penn (CEO of Burson-Marsteller) calls a DIY Doctor in his book Microtrends – page 91.

Manhattan Research recently came out with a study, Catch the New Pharmaceutical Marketing Wave: Trends & Strategies for Reaching Today’s Healthcare Consumer, which says that over 60 million U.S. adults are Health 2.0 consumers “reporting the use of social media applications for healthcare and medical purposes.”  The most popular activities include reading health blogs, posting health content online, and using online patient support groups.  But now there are also a growing number of individuals that are rating treatments and medicines.

And where is the next trend - mobile, the study shows that already over 10 million U.S. adults use their mobile devices to search for health and medical information…soon it will be that my wife will research her symptoms, make her doctors appointment, provide her medical records, and pay all through her mobile.

Check out Erin’s post about the online Doctor