Health information-seeking behaviour of South-Asian immigrant women in Finland: A socio-cultrual perspective

This article presents health information-seeking behaviour of immigrant women, their challenges in seeking health information and the potential socio-cultural factors influencing those challenges. It contributes to the field of information behaviour and helps in designing better information services for immigrants. Twelve semi-structured interviews were carried out with South-Asian immigrant women living in Finland. The study illustrates that participants seek physical and mental health information through family, friends, doctors and online sources. The main challenges in health information seeking are the lack of information about health services, fear from information seeking and sharing and not satisfied with information from the doctors in Finland. The potential socio-cultural factors are the cultural and language differences and the perception about the Finnish healthcare system and doctors’ behaviours. The study has strong practical implications for health centres and health professionals dealing with immigrants’ health matters in designing better health services and communication strategies for immigrants in Finland.