Quality of Health Information on the Internet for Urolithiasis on the Google Search Engine

Abstract

Purpose. To compare the quality of health information on the Internet for keywords related to urolithiasis, to assess for difference in information quality across four main Western languages, and to compare the source of sponsorship in these websites. Methods. Health On the Net (HON) Foundation principles were utilised to determine quality information. Fifteen keywords related to urolithiasis were searched on the Google search engine. The first 150 websites were assessed against the HON principles and the source of sponsorship determined. Results. A total of 8986 websites were analysed. A proportion of HON-accredited websites for individual search terms range between 2.5% and 12.0%. The first 50 websites were more likely to be HON-positive compared to websites 51–100 and 101–150. French websites searched were more likely to be HON-positive whereas German websites were less likely to be HON-positive than English websites. There was no statistically significant difference between the rate of HON-positive English and Spanish websites. The three main website sponsors were from government/educational sources (40.2%), followed by commercial (29.9%) and physician/surgeon sources (18.6%). Conclusions. Health information on most urolithiasis websites was not validated. Nearly one-third of websites in this study have commercial sponsorship. Doctors should recognise the need for more reliable health websites for their patients.

Health on the Net: Do Website Searches Return Reliable Health Information on Hemorrhoids and Their Treatment?

“…Less than 1 in 13 websites in this study were accredited by the HON Foundation. This mirrors findings in studies relating to urological conditions, 11,14 with higher rates reported in oncologic studies. 10,13 Although the low rate of HON-accredited websites is concerning, we found that topranking results had a significantly higher rate of HON accreditation, reaching one-third of first search result websites.…”

“…This mirrors findings in other studies. 11 Although we had concerns initially that marketing and commercial interests could bias the available health information, we found the majority of commercially-sponsored HON-accredited websites to be large private hospital networks and commercial health information networks, rather than manufacturers and service marketing. These large firms employ large managerial and editorial teams to ensure correct accreditation of their websites, contrasting with government and education agencies, which often rely on their brand name and sponsorship status to support their impartiality and authority.…”

“…We used previously-described methodology. [9][10][11][12][13][14] Using the Google search engine (http://www.google. com/) we searched for 11 keywords related to hemorrhoids (''haemorrhoid,'' ''haemorrhoids,'' ''haemorrhoid surgery,'' ''haemorrhoid treatment,'' ''haemorrhoidectomy,'' ''haemorrhoid banding,'' ''piles,'' ''external haemorrhoids,'' ''internal haemorrhoids,'' ''thrombosed haemorrhoids,'' ''haemorrhoid cream'') and the respective equivalent terms in French, German, Italian, and Spanish.…”

Google Medical Update: Why Is the Search Engine Decreasing Visibility of Health and Medical Information Websites?

“…DISCERN consists of 15 key questions plus an overall quality rating. Each question represents a separate quality criterion [13]. The 8-point HONcode assesses the following principles: authority, complementarity, privacy, attribution, justifiability, transparency, financial disclosure, and advertising policy [14].…”

“…In terms of analyzing search engine results, this field is divided into two areas. First, researchers are evaluating organic results displayed by search engines with tools that are widely used today such as HONcode [13], the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) benchmarks, and the DISCERN tool [14], and scales such as Flesch-Kincaid reading level and Flesch reading ease [14]. Results from Google are downloaded and evaluated [16] with regard to how they answer health questions [17], for example, from parents on neonatal intensive care [18], or on palliative care [19] or human papillomavirus vaccination [20]; and there are large systematic reviews of autoimmune diseases [21].…”