Abstract
This study investigates California newspaper articles from a two year time period to identify the substantive and affective attributes that comprise print media coverage of telemedicine. A total of 206 descriptions were identified and a qualitative content analysis was conducted in order to determine the major attribute categories for descriptions of telemedicine. Seven categories were revealed, including descriptions of: the technologies used for telemedicine, the ability to provide access to medical services, details of implementation, the quality of medical care, financial aspects, the convenience of using telemedicine, and other descriptions. Of these, over half of the descriptions focused on the technology or access attributes of telemedicine. All descriptions were also quantitatively coded for the level of affect. A Chi square analysis revealed that while descriptions were predominantly positive across all of the articles, the urban-based news sources tended to discuss telemedicine in a more positive tone than rural-based sources. Through the emphasis of the access and technology attributes, there is support for the premise that these attributes may become the most salient attributes to the audience. As the tone is predominantly positive, additional research is necessary to determine if this may serve to prime the audience to accept telemedicine.