The quality of dietary information on the World Wide Web

The quality of dietary information on the World Wide Web (WWW) is determined solely by the organizations and individuals who publish it. To evaluate the accuracy of nutrition resources on the Internet, a survey of WWW sites that provided dietary recommendations were reviewed and compared to the "Canadian Guidelines for Healthy Eating and Nutrition Recommendations for Canadians." Web sites were accessed using "diet," "food," and "nutrition" as keywords in searches. Of the 365 documents accessed, 167 contained dietary recommendations. Forty-five percent (n = 76) of these provided information that was not consistent with one or more of the Canadian eating standards and included information in the forms of advertisements recommending supplements, herbal remedies, weight-loss products, and promotion of specific diets. The total number of web sites that provided information that was inconsistent with Canadian guidelines per each keyword search was 25 (29.8%) for "diet," 11 (13.1%) for "food," and 48 (57.1%) for "nutrition." Sources of differing information included individual web pages (n = 31, 40.8%), private vendors (n = 44, 57.9%), and health organizations (n = 1, 1.3%). Because Internet resources continue to increase at an incredible pace, health professionals need to take an active role in this technology and develop strategies to address inconsistent dietary information provided through this avenue.