Promoting the use of health information and communication technologies in Spain: a new approach based on the ICT-H

The rapid growth of the use of new technologies is having an important effect on individuals’ health knowledge and behavior. The objective of this paper is to study the potential reduction in health care utilization associated with the expansion of new technologies. Using Spanish micro data from the Survey on the Equipment and Use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT-H) in Households for 2014 we analyze information technologies equipment, availability of access and means of Internet connection per household. We model the probability of an individual being internet user in Spain as a function of a range of socio-economic characteristics, including individual’s gender, age, education and employment situation. Also, we hypothesized that a greater use of this communication technologies is related to a lesser health care expenditure.