Transcending traditional product lines of foods, drugs, devices, and providers, today's medical organizations" market" intangibles such as risk-assessment/reduction, self-care and self-triage, plan/network enrollment, and, more generally, appropriate utilization of the professional resources they provide. Thus, health care offers its constituents specific benefits for purchasing and utilizing their offerings in certain ways.

Ironically, an increasingly customer-centered industry must now control customer expectations and manage demand as never before. Thus, the importance of communicating specific differences between appropriate and inappropriate care-seeking and lifestyle behaviors has never been greater. Behavioral changes are more likely to derive from personal experience than through abstract reasoning. The Web permits the integration of multimedia learning tools, updated information, a range of reputable sources and easy access to the histories of others. However, it often lacks a means through which to integrate an individual's characteristics and experience into Web-based health-related information-seeking.