Addressing the Needs of the Uninsured
The WorldDoc Foundation strives to provide health services to uninsured and underinsured groups. WorldDoc’s Personal Health Management System allows individuals to research and better understand health concerns and treatment options. Nearly 40% of WorldDoc user’s indicate that they make at least one fewer visit to the doctor or emergency room each year because of the information they find on the WorldDoc site (User Survey September 2005).

Not only can WorldDoc help uninsured families reduce unnecessary doctor visits, but also improve the communication between healthcare providers and patients when they do see a doctor. The targeted information on WorldDoc helps individuals prepare for and understand information from healthcare providers on conditions and treatments, leading to fewer complications and fewer hospitalizations.

For uninsured households without Internet Access, WorldDoc has experience in providing kiosks in key locations and setting up site licenses among community-based organizations concerned about healthcare access for uninsured groups.

Reducing the Use of Hospitals Emergency Rooms for Non-Emergent Care
In many communities uninsured and others are using hospital emergency rooms for primary healthcare in non-emergent situations. The result is long waits while true emergency patients receive medical attention. Placing WorldDoc kiosks in waiting areas allows waiting patients to research their health concerns and learn about prevention, alternative treatments and community-based medical treatment options. WorldDoc is seeking hospital partners interested in improving services provided through their emergency departments without compromising patient health.

Chronic Care Management
The WorldDoc Foundation is seeking partners who are working with populations with chronic care needs – especially in the areas of diabetes, asthma, congestive heart failure and coronary artery disease. WorldDoc chronic care management tools help patients and their physicians better understand and communicate health goals, wellness/prevention activities and behaviors that promote effective disease management. WorldDoc has developed customized care management tools to help care providers identify patients with specific chronic health needs and track the provision of assistance to these patients, resulting in improved health and longer periods of independent living by patients.

HIV Prevention and AIDS Patient Empowerment
The WorldDoc Foundation believes that WorldDoc 24/7 is ideally suited to support programs that are providing HIV prevention education to at-risk populations. WorldDoc is working to develop an HIV risk assessment tool that will engage at-risk group members to learn about prevention actions. Since AIDS can results in a wide range of health challenges, WorldDoc tools are ideally suited for use by active AIDS patients to understand and better manage their health issues.

Reducing Health Disparities
In many communities there is a rapid increase in the number of Spanish speaking households. Statistically, Hispanic people are two times more likely to not have health insurance than Caucasians. To make health information more accessible to Spanish speaking populations, WorldDoc continues to translate key portions of its medical library into Spanish. The WorldDoc Foundation is seeking partners serving Hispanic households where health disparities are evident.

Senior Centers
The WorldDoc Foundation is developing a special implementation plan for providing WorldDoc 24/7 site licenses to senior centers, including the training of senior volunteers to assist center participants to utilize WorldDoc to better understand their health needs. Included in this package is a new tool to help seniors understand the impact of the new Medicare Part D, a government prescription benefit program.

Colleges and Universities
The WorldDoc Foundation aims to form partnerships to provide college students WorldDoc 24/7 access as part of college/university health programs. Because students are used to searching and finding information using the Internet, WorldDoc’s tools should be a great asset for them to improve their health and lower utilization of college/university health resources. The WorldDoc Foundation is seeking a few regionally diverse colleges and universities willing to help evaluate the effectiveness and costs associated with implementing WorldDoc tools for students and to help develop content addressing special needs and concerns of student age populations.