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Patients go online. The development of ICT for patient users is a prioritised area in contemporary health care. As with all socio-technical changes, we cannot know the exact outcomes of this development in advance. Neither what it will mean to patients, nor if it will correspond to the expectations of developers and policy makers. This book investigates the policy background for patient oriented ICT, and the changes that take place in patients everyday lives when health ICT is introduced to them. Findings from qualitative interviews with patients and health providers are contrasted with findings from a study of e-health policy documents. In sum the empirical works presented reveal that patient-oriented ICT does more than is expected of it. Patient-ICT practices contribute to change expectations towards health and health care, and opens for a new flexibility in patients relationship to health professional advice and care. The book argues that studies of online patients require a perspective that is attentive to the active role of users and technologies in micro practice, but that remains open to discuss the importance of technology to patients on conceptual and structural levels.

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Hege K. Andreassen is a senior researcher at the Norwegian Centre for Integrated Care and Telemedicine (NST). She holds a PhD in sociology from the University of Troms›, Norway, and is especially interested in medical sociology and science technology studies. Her work concentrates on the relations between patients, professionals, health and ICT.

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