*Department of Media Sciences, Anna University, Chennai, India
**Accenture Services India Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India
***Department of Social Work, Pondicherry University, Puducherry, India
Online published on 5 October, 2011.
Health Communication is one of the important functions of the Print Medium because they not only create awareness among the public regarding various diseases and their symptoms but also influence reader's health care decisions based on the health information they provide. So the Journalists have a special responsibility in covering the health and medical news. And the quality of news published needs to be analyzed for betterment of the health news coverage. There are lots of health related scientific and technical terms which need to be communicated in a simplified manner for the understanding of a common man. This could be well done only by the print medium. Hence there is an underlined need for analyzing the print media coverage of health news. This study was conducted to understand the effectiveness of the print media in health communication in Chennai with special reference to two English newspapers, The Hindu and Deccan Chronicle. Content Analysis of these newspapers were done for a period of three months from November 2008 to January 2009 to study the number of articles being published and the importance given to health communication. The interview with experts gave a clear insight into the existing problem in health communication and gave their suggestions for improving the health communication to the general public.
