Online communication has become a potential means of communication between patients and health care providers, but so far few studies are published about online communication as part of nursing care. The aim of this study was to explore how an online patient-nurse communication (OPNC) service meets the information needs of men with newly diagnosed testicular cancer. We applied a qualitative approach by examining the content of online messages sent by patients to nurses in a specialist cancer unit. In addition, individual interviews were conducted with patients who had used the OPNC service. Four themes became distinct through a synthesis of the material from the interviews and the messages: “a means for managing illness-related concerns at home,” “a means for ensuring information flow,” “a means for strategic information seeking,” and “not yet available when needed most.” Individualized information provided by nurses with access to their medical record was shown to be important to these patients. The findings of this study indicate that not only may access to an OPNC service help patients fulfill their otherwise unmet information needs, but also it may prevent delays and discontinuity in care due to informational gaps and lead to improved patient safety. 1. Introduction In recent years, online communication has become one of the means by which patients can communicate with their health care providers, but its benefits have been disputed. Early studies included warnings that there might be some reduction in the quality of communication when using e-mail, since it entails the loss of nonverbal social cues that provide valuable contextual information in conversation [1]. Concerns have also been expressed that e-mail may reduce patient-provider communication to brief, task-specific electronic exchanges [2]. However, Roter et al. demonstrate that e-mail is an effective means of communicating health information, and that it can be a vehicle for providing emotional support as well as for building a therapeutic partnership. They conclude that the asynchronicity of place afforded by e-mail, with patients at home, may help to free patients from the social constraints of their role as a patient and enable them to convey sensitive, embarrassing, or especially distressing information that may be withheld in face-to-face visits [3]. Most studies of online communication between patients and staff in a healthcare setting have involved communication between patients and physicians [3–6]. To our knowledge, only a few studies so far have explored in depth patients’
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