Digital Health Technology Use Across Socioeconomic Groups Prior to and During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Panel Study

Background:

Digital technologies have become more important in the healthcare sector in the past decades. This transition from conventional to digital healthcare has been accelerated by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which poses the risk of creating a ‘digital divide’, inadvertently placing those who are older, economically disadvantaged, and less educated at a disadvantage.

Objective:

The current study focuses on the influence of socio-economic factors on adoption of digital health technology in the Frisian population and how this relation is affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods:

In 2019 and 2020, a longitudinal panel study was conducted on digital health in the Frisian population. In the survey, the use of digital health technology was operationalized in a broad sense, going beyond the care context by also including preventative health promoting solutions generally available on the consumer market, such as wearables and lifestyle applications. First, a generalized linear model was fit with use of digital health application as dependent variable and socio-economic factors as between subject factors on the 2019 data. Second, a generalized linear mixed model was fit with use of digital health application as dependent variable, COVID-19 as within subjects variable and socio-economic factors as between subject factors.

Results:

Our results showed that prior to the COVID-19 pandemic digital health technology use was higher in women, younger people, and those who are well-educated and economically more privileged. In addition, we found interaction effects of COVID-19 with age and education attainment, indicating that the lower use among people in older age categories and in people with lower education attainment became less apparent from 2019 to 2020.

Conclusions:

Our findings on the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the digital divide indicated that the elderly and less educated caught up a little during COVID-19. Future research should focus on whether this effect persists after COVID-19 and on vulnerable groups that still require special attention to ensure proper access to healthcare and social services and preventive health promotion solutions for these vulnerable groups.