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Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders
BACKGROUND: The Internet has become a powerful, accessible resource for many patients to use for their own medical management and knowledge. Vestibular disorders are prevalent, especially in the elderly. As the Internet is increasingly a major source of health-related information to the general publ...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
IOS Press
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9249283/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32333571 http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/VES-200698 |
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author | Felipe, Lilian Beukes, Eldré W. Fox, Baylie A. Manchaiah, Vinaya |
author_facet | Felipe, Lilian Beukes, Eldré W. Fox, Baylie A. Manchaiah, Vinaya |
author_sort | Felipe, Lilian |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: The Internet has become a powerful, accessible resource for many patients to use for their own medical management and knowledge. Vestibular disorders are prevalent, especially in the elderly. As the Internet is increasingly a major source of health-related information to the general public, it is often used to search for information regarding dizziness and vertigo. Ensuring that the information is accessible, unbiased, and appropriate can aid informed decision-making. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the quality and readability of English-language Internet information related to vestibular disorders. METHODS: A cross-sectional website search using three keywords (nausea, dizziness, and vertigo) in five country-specific versions of the most commonly used Internet search engine was conducted in March 2018. The language was limited to English for all websites. Quality was assessed by presence of Health on the Net (HON) certification and DISCERN scores. Readability was assessed using the Flesch Reading Ease (FRE) score, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Formula (F-KGL), and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG). RESULTS: In total, 112 websites were included and analyzed. The majority were commercial (61%) websites. A total of 42% had obtained HON certification. No association was found between the presence of HON certification and the resource of the website. The DISCERN scores had a mean of 2.52 (SD 1.1). Readability measures indicated that an average of 14–18 years of education was required to read and understand the Internet information provided regarding vestibular disorders. CONCLUSIONS: To ensure the accessible to the general population, it is necessary to improve the quality and readability of Internet-based information regarding vestibular disorders. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9249283 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | IOS Press |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-92492832022-07-05 Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders Felipe, Lilian Beukes, Eldré W. Fox, Baylie A. Manchaiah, Vinaya J Vestib Res Research Article BACKGROUND: The Internet has become a powerful, accessible resource for many patients to use for their own medical management and knowledge. Vestibular disorders are prevalent, especially in the elderly. As the Internet is increasingly a major source of health-related information to the general public, it is often used to search for information regarding dizziness and vertigo. Ensuring that the information is accessible, unbiased, and appropriate can aid informed decision-making. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the quality and readability of English-language Internet information related to vestibular disorders. METHODS: A cross-sectional website search using three keywords (nausea, dizziness, and vertigo) in five country-specific versions of the most commonly used Internet search engine was conducted in March 2018. The language was limited to English for all websites. Quality was assessed by presence of Health on the Net (HON) certification and DISCERN scores. Readability was assessed using the Flesch Reading Ease (FRE) score, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Formula (F-KGL), and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG). RESULTS: In total, 112 websites were included and analyzed. The majority were commercial (61%) websites. A total of 42% had obtained HON certification. No association was found between the presence of HON certification and the resource of the website. The DISCERN scores had a mean of 2.52 (SD 1.1). Readability measures indicated that an average of 14–18 years of education was required to read and understand the Internet information provided regarding vestibular disorders. CONCLUSIONS: To ensure the accessible to the general population, it is necessary to improve the quality and readability of Internet-based information regarding vestibular disorders. IOS Press 2020-05-18 /pmc/articles/PMC9249283/ /pubmed/32333571 http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/VES-200698 Text en © 2020 – IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Felipe, Lilian Beukes, Eldré W. Fox, Baylie A. Manchaiah, Vinaya Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title | Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title_full | Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title_fullStr | Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title_full_unstemmed | Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title_short | Quality and readability of English-language Internet information for vestibular disorders |
title_sort | quality and readability of english-language internet information for vestibular disorders |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9249283/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32333571 http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/VES-200698 |
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