Readability of online COVID-19 health information: a comparison between four English speaking countries

Abstract

Background The internet is now the first line source of health information for many people worldwide. In the current Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic, health information is being produced, revised, updated and disseminated at an increasingly rapid rate. The general public are faced with a plethora of misinformation regarding COVID-19 and the readability of online information has an impact on their understanding of the disease. The accessibility of online healthcare information relating to COVID-19 is unknown. We sought to evaluate the readability of online information relating to COVID-19 in four English speaking regions: Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States, and compare readability of website source provenance and regional origin. Methods The Google® search engine was used to collate the first 20 webpage URLs for three individual searches for ‘COVID’, ‘COVID-19’, and ‘coronavirus’ from Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. The Gunning Fog Index (GFI), Flesch-Kincaid Grade (FKG) Score, Flesch Reading Ease Score (FRES), Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) score were calculated to assess the readability. Results There were poor levels of readability webpages reviewed, with only 17.2% of webpages at a universally readable level. There was a significant difference in readability between the different webpages based on their information source (p < 0.01). Public Health organisations and Government organisations provided the most readable COVID-19 material, while digital media sources were significantly less readable. There were no significant differences in readability between regions. Conclusion Much of the general public have relied on online information during the pandemic. Information on COVID-19 should be made more readable, and those writing webpages and information tools should ensure universal accessibility is considered in their production. Governments and healthcare practitioners should have an awareness of the online sources of information available, and ensure that readability of our own productions is at a universally readable level which will increase understanding and adherence to health guidelines.

Gender Balance and Readability of COVID-19 Scientific Publishing: A Quantitative Analysis of 90,000 Preprint Manuscripts

“…Given the rise of the Internet as a primary tool for scientific information and dissemination, the combination of poor readability of online medical information and potential scientific errors erodes public trust [47][48][49] . The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the role of accessibility, with preprint papers being released at a rapid pace and used to guide both individual action and public policy 50 .…”

Bibliotherapy. Reading Recomendation experiencing Exclusion during COVID-19

“…akademinės bendruomenės narių Indijos universitetuose karantino metu skaitymui naudojo popierinius ir elektroninius šaltinius, 14 % tik elektroninius, 7 % tik popierinius [4]. Didžioji visuomenės dalis pandemijos metu rėmėsi informacija internete [5]. Rezultatai rodo, kad naujienų skaitymas krizės metu žmonėms padidino nerimą [6].…”

“…Tyrėjų [3][4][5][6][7] duomenimis, dauguma žmonių karantino metu skaitė internetu. Šio tyrimo duomenys papildyti informacija apie kūrinio pasiekiamumą Lietuvos bibliotekų portale ibiblioteka.lt.…”

Empowering the public during the COVID pandemic through interactive social media platform

“…According to the Taiwan National Development Council (2016), 67% of the adults obtained health information through the Internet. Worrall et al.’s (2020) reported that Google searches on the COVID-related topics have significantly increased during the pandemic. The public uses mobile and social media as key sources to obtain COVID-related information for decision-making and actions ( Google Trends, 2020 ).…”