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Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites

Introduction Most medical school applicants use the internet as a source of information when applying for medical school. Previous analyses have evaluated residency and fellowship websites; however, an in-depth analysis of medical school websites is lacking. Methods We evaluated 192 United States (U...

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Autores principales: Pollock, Jordan R, Moore, Michael L, Smith, Jacob F, Woolstenhulme, Jonny B, Markham, Dane J, Rhees, Joshua R, Poole, Kenneth, Pollock, Nathan T, Patel, Naresh P
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Cureus 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8266258/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34268052
http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.15534
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author Pollock, Jordan R
Moore, Michael L
Smith, Jacob F
Woolstenhulme, Jonny B
Markham, Dane J
Rhees, Joshua R
Poole, Kenneth
Pollock, Nathan T
Patel, Naresh P
author_facet Pollock, Jordan R
Moore, Michael L
Smith, Jacob F
Woolstenhulme, Jonny B
Markham, Dane J
Rhees, Joshua R
Poole, Kenneth
Pollock, Nathan T
Patel, Naresh P
author_sort Pollock, Jordan R
collection PubMed
description Introduction Most medical school applicants use the internet as a source of information when applying for medical school. Previous analyses have evaluated residency and fellowship websites; however, an in-depth analysis of medical school websites is lacking. Methods We evaluated 192 United States (US) medical school websites for presence or absence of 39 items relevant to medical school applicants. Items fell into seven general categories: curriculum, research, demographics of incoming class, admissions information, faculty, financial aid, and social. Results Of the 192 websites evaluated (152 allopathic and 40 osteopathic schools), websites contained a mean of 23 items (59%) with a standard deviation of 4.2 items. Conclusion Our study examining US medical school websites revealed a lack of online information for medical school applicants. As medical school interviews transition to being online during the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of the medical school website to applicants becomes increasingly crucial. The information contained in our study could be used to improve the functionality and quality of information on medical school websites, which could help both applicants and the medical schools themselves.
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spelling pubmed-82662582021-07-14 Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites Pollock, Jordan R Moore, Michael L Smith, Jacob F Woolstenhulme, Jonny B Markham, Dane J Rhees, Joshua R Poole, Kenneth Pollock, Nathan T Patel, Naresh P Cureus Medical Education Introduction Most medical school applicants use the internet as a source of information when applying for medical school. Previous analyses have evaluated residency and fellowship websites; however, an in-depth analysis of medical school websites is lacking. Methods We evaluated 192 United States (US) medical school websites for presence or absence of 39 items relevant to medical school applicants. Items fell into seven general categories: curriculum, research, demographics of incoming class, admissions information, faculty, financial aid, and social. Results Of the 192 websites evaluated (152 allopathic and 40 osteopathic schools), websites contained a mean of 23 items (59%) with a standard deviation of 4.2 items. Conclusion Our study examining US medical school websites revealed a lack of online information for medical school applicants. As medical school interviews transition to being online during the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of the medical school website to applicants becomes increasingly crucial. The information contained in our study could be used to improve the functionality and quality of information on medical school websites, which could help both applicants and the medical schools themselves. Cureus 2021-06-08 /pmc/articles/PMC8266258/ /pubmed/34268052 http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.15534 Text en Copyright © 2021, Pollock et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Medical Education
Pollock, Jordan R
Moore, Michael L
Smith, Jacob F
Woolstenhulme, Jonny B
Markham, Dane J
Rhees, Joshua R
Poole, Kenneth
Pollock, Nathan T
Patel, Naresh P
Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title_full Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title_fullStr Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title_full_unstemmed Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title_short Content and Functionality of United States Medical School Websites
title_sort content and functionality of united states medical school websites
topic Medical Education
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8266258/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34268052
http://dx.doi.org/10.7759/cureus.15534
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