Information, Communication and Society- Special Issue on e-Health Call for Papers The area of e-Health is now huge and covers a wide range of socio-technical innovations in health service delivery and organisation. This Special Issue will explore just one key area of e-Health- the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the communication of health information and advice - both to patients/public and between members of the public. Health policy documents in many countries suggest that the greater availability of health information via the Internet will necessarily lead to the emergence of more informed patients who are better able to assess the risks and benefits of different treatments for themselves. The now widely used notion of 'informed choice' is indicative of the greater agency and sense of empowerment said to be experienced by such patients. Such thinking exists within sociology, too, where, following Giddens' notion of the 'reflexive consumer', there is some support for the idea that the overall expansion in medical knowledge via new media technologies such as the Internet will empower patients. This Special Issue of iCS seeks to explore the assumptions embedded in this 'informed patient' discourse through empirically-based papers which explore the extent and nature of Internet use in a range of settings and its relationship to patient empowerment and more equitable practitioner-patient relationships. Topic areas we hope to cover include: * Creation and use of health information websites by both health care professionals and the public * Use of the Internet in consultations between practitioners and patients * Online health chat and self-help groups * * Key cross-cutting themes we hope to examine include: * * Access and equality issues * Information quality * Practitioner-patient relations * Information and empowerment Deadline for submission of papers: Monday 17th November 2003. Co-editors: Flis Henwood, Brighton University, UK and Ellen Balka, SFU, Canada. Please send all submissions to: Dr Flis Henwood Social Informatics Research Unit School of Computing, Mathematical and Information Sciences University of Brighton, Watts Building, Lewes Road Brighton BN2 4GJ f.henwood@bton.ac.uk or tel +44 (0)1273 643341 Brian D. Loader General Editor, iCS CIRA, University of Teesside, Middlesbrough, Tees Valley, TS1 3BA UK Tel: +44 (0) 1642 342710 Fax: +44 (0) 1642 342711 www.infosoc.co.uk b.d.loader@tees.ac.uk