E-mail is the most popular form of social media among consumers sharing health info, data from a recent survey show.

Eighteen percent of consumer online health connectors used e-mail to share their personal
experiences and opinions about health issues, followed by support groups or boards and blogs, said Monique Levy, senior analyst with Jupiter Research.

Levy is lead researcher on Jupiter Research’s report, “Online Health: Assessing the Risk and Opportunity of Social and One-to-One Media.” The report presents insights about the online habits of 2,104 randomly selected US consumers from a survey conducted in November.

Levy said 13% of surveyed consumers read or posted a health-related message through a support board, compared with 21% of online users doing so for other reasons. Similarly, 10% of users read a health-related blog during the past year, while 23% read a blog for other reasons.

A majority of those surveyed, 66% said they used none of the aforementioned social media tools.