Digital Health Literacy and Practice among Physicians in Government Teaching Hospitals of Addis Ababa: A Cross-Sectional Study
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2025-06
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Background: Digital health is becoming crucial for improving health outcome and providing
patient centered care. World nations are integrating digital health policies and strategies to
achieve digitalization of health care. However utilization and successful adoption of these
technologies require physicians’ literacy, but there is limited study on digital health literacy of
physicians and its influence on digital health practices.
Objective: This study aimed to assess the digital health literacy and practice among physicians
in government teaching hospitals in Addis Ababa.
Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted from March to April 2025. A representative
quantitative data from government teaching hospitals in Addis Ababa collected through
structured questionnaire among 394 physicians. Data was entered and cleaned in excel then
exported to SPSS 26.0 for analysis. Descriptive statistics, Binary and multivariable logistic
regression were carried out and P value of < 0.05, adjusted odds ratio (AOR) with 95%
confidence interval (CI) was used to determine variables significantly associated with digital
health practices.
Result: In this study, out of all respondents 50.3% of physicians had high digital health practice
and digital health literacy of 58.2%. Higher digital health literacy (AOR=2.05 95% CI: 1.27-3.3),
limited access to digital tools at workplace (AOR= 0.18, 95% CI: 0.06-0.5), training on digital
health (AOR=2.05, 95% CI: 1.16-3.6), being general practitioner (AOR= 0.26, 95% CI: 0.1-0.6)
were found to be significant factors associated with digital health practice.
Conclusion: Although more than half of the physicians had high digital health literacy, the
practical use in clinical service was low and limited to facility based digital tools and
technologies. To enhance digitalization of health care, for future adoption and implementation,
stakeholders including Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education and health facilities should take
appropriate measures in implementing guidelines, platforms and strategies for physicians with
pre-service training and in-service professional development programs.
Description
Keywords
Digital health, Digital health literacy, Digital health practice, Physicians, Digital health utilization, eHealth