The purpose of this article is to investigate if there is any correlation between disease frequency and publication of health related books, so as to provide a new direction for publishing health books that could contribute to promoting people’s hea...
The purpose of this article is to investigate if there is any correlation between disease frequency and publication of health related books, so as to provide a new direction for publishing health books that could contribute to promoting people’s health. Disease incidence between 2003 and 2013 and health books on disease treatment and prevention published during the same period of time were investigated. Disease incidence was measured by the rate of change in the number of visits to doctor’s office on the basis of statistics by the National Health Insurance Service (NHIS). Disease-related health books refer to the books in the ‘disease treatment and prevention’ category of Aladin, an internet book store.
To obtain incidence rates of particular diseases, numbers of visits to doctor’s office for 500 most frequent diseases each year and the medical expenses were calculated on the basis of ‘Insurance Benefits Payed for 500 Most Frequent Diseases in the Subcategories of Diseases’ published by the NHIS. Professional opinions from physicians, dentists and pharmacists were reflected as well to help establish a direction for health book publication.
This study revealed the following results:
First, health book refers to ‘publications that deal with not only diseases but also physical, mental, social and spiritual well-being required for daily life, including works, exercises, meals, resting and sleeping’.
Second, compared to 0.51% population growth, 0.60% increase in the population covered by national health insurance, 1.3% increase in the number of visits to doctor’s office, and 14.2% growth in medical expenses per year between 2003 and 2013, the number of health book titles published on the market has increased by 12.2%, which is positive because it generally means that the publication of disease-related health books has exceeded disease frequency.
Third, out of 14 disease categories investigated in this study, 7 disease categories (teeth, ear, constipation/hemorrhoid, mental illness, alopecia, skin disease and herniated disc/spinal disease) showed a higher rate of increase in published titles compared to the rate of increase in the number of people visiting doctor’s office or in medical expenses, demonstrating how active the publishing industry has been in this area. Publication has also increased for books on other disease categories, such as the liver, hypertension, eye, nose, diabetes and gastrointestinal disorders, which was lower than the rate of increase in medical expenses but still higher than the rate of increase in the number of visits to doctor’s office. These results indicate that health book publication is keeping up with disease frequency quite well.
Fourth, there were none or less than 10 titles on acute upper respiratory infection and allergy, which are in the lower rankings in terms of risk but account for more than 10 million visits to doctor’s office and more than 1 trillion won for medical expenses, or on common cold, thyroid disease, involutional period, hyperlipidemia, headache, rheumatoid arthritis and prostate, which account for more than 1 million visits to doctor’s office and more than 100 billion won for medical expenses, showing how health book publishers need to readdress their understanding of the issue.
There were only 1-3 titles on medical examination and diagnosis. Besides, there were only 2 titles on virus and prevention of contagious diseases published in 11 years, one on virus and the other on prevention of SARS, despite the fact that they may bring about a national emergency as the recent case of MERS outbreak. These are the areas that need more books published even through government support.
Fifth, health book publications specializing in cancer has not been very active until the mid-2000s. Currently, more than 80% of health books on cancer are ‘general health’ books providing only the basic knowledge on cancer, which is not sufficient for investigating the correlation between cancer incidence and health books.
Sixth, our results indicated a considerable correlation between overall disease frequency and health book publication. However, health book publications were nonexistent or very poor on diseases that have a lot of patients but not a big medical market, transient or non-life-threatening diseases, or diseases without a particular preventive measure or therapy, regardless of their frequency or medical expenses.
Seventh, we could obtain several professional advices in this study: “We need more reliable health books to raise awareness and knowledge of diseases in the population and to contribute to public health”, said Jeong Hyeon Kim. “Health books existed not only as a business for publishing industry but also as a crucial part for promoting public health. The Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Education would need to consider supporting the publication of health books on diseases not actively dealt with by the industry”, said Bong Gyu Yoo. Finally, Jong Kwan Go said that “As we are swarmed by all kinds of information from TV, internet and smartphone, people now tend to read books less than before. We are in need of publisher’s introspection and innovation to overcome this issue.”
One of the limitations of this study is that the scope of health books was limited to ‘disease treatment and prevention’ and that it depended only on the bibliographic categories of the internet bookstore. Estimating disease incidence only on the basis of visits to doctor’s office and the rate of change in medical expenses is another limitation.
A future study would be necessary for various categories of health books as suggested in the definition of health book. Factors affecting publisher’s decision to publish a health book, satisfaction on health books among consumers of medical services, and a comparison of how health information is reliable and influential between mass media and health books would make an interesting topics to study. It would be also helpful to investigate health book publications in developed countries including the US and Japan in order to provide a new direction for health book publishing in Korea.