Following
up from last week, I wanted to go more in depth on the importance of getting
health information from credible sources. According to a recent study, 80% of
people reporting to b internet users used the internet to research a disease or
treatment. 82% of Pharmacists surveyed were asked a question by a patient about
information they obtained on the internet. This shows how important the
internet is to people when it comes to finding information about their health
care.
In
the usual course, a patient is given a medication or treatment, diagnosed with
a disease, or recommended something by their doctor. The patient types this
subject into a google search, and clicks on the first 1-5 links that come up.
Undoubtedly, Wikipedia is one of those first five links. However, Wikipedia
content has been found to be inaccurate and incomplete when compared to other
more credible sources of information. What was even more alarming to me than
patients looking up health information on Wikipedia was the amount of
healthcare providers that have admittedly used Wikipedia as a source.
Convenience and ease of use is important, but it doesn’t always reflect the
content of the website.
Grossman
and Zerilli wrote an article on how to discern a credible source from a not
credible source on the web. The first recommendation is to consider the website
on which the article is found. What is the purpose of the site? Is the
information objective? Who runs the site? If the site is run by a commercial
company about a certain drug, this is different from a blog run by an
individual or a government-funded health library. What is the url? Url’s that
end in .edu, .org, or .gov are more likely to have quality information when
compared to .com sites which can be geared toward promoting a certain product
or treatment. Are there advertisements on the website? Can you easily
differentiate the advertisement from the content of the article? This is
important because advertisements are notorious for being misleading. Websites
that are intended for advertisement or promotion of a certain product must be
carefully scrutinized for credibility, as it is not infrequent for
manufacturers or a certain product to inflate the greatness of their product.
Next,
evaluate the article details before reading the article. Is the author listed?
If an author is listed, especially if correspondence is provided so that
questions may be asked, the site is likely more credible than an article that
was written anonymously. Are references noted? It is very important to decide
where the information found in the article came from. If the author has listed
several primary literature sources and trials, the information is likely to be
complete. When was the article written? If it was written in 1985, it might be helpful
to find more recent information, as health care is a field that is constantly
evolving.
To
make things easier, there are two organizations that rate websites or articles based
on their content so that users can be more assured that the content is
credible. These ratings are not concrete, and the organizations do not
guarantee credibility, but it is a helpful step. The Utilization Review
Accreditation Commission and the Health on the Net Foundation are these two
organizations. Internet users can be more at ease with the content of an
article if the HONcode or URAC-accredited stamp is on the article or website. Sample seals are included at the bottom of
this post.
It
is important that if you as a patient are looking for credible information on
the internet, speak with your doctor about websites or articles that he/she
recommends. Most health care providers understand patients’ desire to learn
more about their conditions, and they try to make information available that
will be easy for the patient to understand. I mentioned in the last post that
regarding fertility, the majority of patients are very highly educated on their
condition and their treatment or therapy. As patients understand their
treatment at a certain level, they need information that is more challenging
and informing. It is important for doctors to be able to provide “the next
level” of information for their patients. Fortunately, there are several
credible health care sites that offer different levels of information on
different disease states.
Ask
your doctor or pharmacist about credible health information websites, or come
back for a future post on individual reviews of credible websites.
Alexis Ireland, PharmD Candidate 2014
References
Grossman S, Zerilli T. Health and medication
information resources on the world wide web. Journal of Pharmacy Practice. 2013
April 01;26(2):85-94.
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