Article
Quality assessment of German websites on immunotherapy for melanoma patients
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Published: | March 6, 2018 |
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Background/Objective: Patients diagnosed with melanoma frequently search the internet for treatment-related information to compensate for informational deficits. However, health literacy is limited among the German population and no quality assessment of websites addressing melanoma patients has been performed so far. Hence, we have identified the most frequent German websites on immunotherapy for melanoma patients and assessed their quality in order to provide an overview.
Methods: Two independent reviewers searched the first 20 hits on Google, Yahoo, and Bing for a combination of German synonyms for “melanoma” and “immunotherapy” in July 2017. After applying exclusion and inclusion criteria, the most frequent websites were identified. Three reviewers independently assessed their quality by using DISCERN and by assessing the presence of a quality certification. The usability and reliability were evaluated by the LIDA tool, understandability and actionability by PEMAT-P. The Flesch Reading Ease Score (FRES) was calculated to estimate readability. Besides, Alexa tool was used to investigate the websites’ popularity. Inter-rater reliability of the three reviewers was calculated using Cohen’s kappa.
Results: Out of 480 websites identified, 45 single websites and 30 domains, respectively, were considered for the quality assessment. As pre-defined, the majority of websites could be categorized as provided by scientific (n=10), general press/public media (n=10), pharmaceutical companies (n=6), or medical online information services (n=7). The average FRES was 16.7 (range -15 to 49), indicating a very difficult readability of website content for lay persons. Overall, only two website domains have displayed a German quality certification (HON-code, AFGIS or Zertifikat Stiftung Gesundheit).
The assessment of the websites’ usability, reliability, understandability and actionability is currently in progress and will presumably be available in January 2018.
Conclusion: Our first results indicate that modification of the most accessible German websites on immunotherapy for melanoma patients is inevitable.