Pediatric surgery on the Internet: is the truth out there?
L E Chen1, R K Minkes, J C Langer
1Division of Pediatric Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis, MO, USA.
Journal of Pediatric Surgery
|August 17, 2000
Summary
Online pediatric surgery information quality varies greatly. Most websites for parents lack completeness and accuracy, necessitating an organized approach to ensure reliable medical data for families.
Area of Science:
- Medical Informatics
- Pediatric Surgery
- Health Communication
Background:
- The internet is a vast, unmonitored source of medical information.
- Assessing the quality of online pediatric surgery content is crucial.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the quality of online information regarding pediatric surgery.
- To evaluate websites for completeness, accuracy, and bias.
Main Methods:
- Searched the internet for pediatric surgery topics: congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH), abdominal wall defects (AWD), pediatric inguinal hernia (IH), and pectus excavatum (PE).
- Characterized, classified, and evaluated 141 websites for completeness, accuracy, and bias.
- Assessed website ownership and target audience (medical professionals vs. lay population).
Main Results:
- 59.6% of websites targeted medical professionals, 46.8% targeted the lay population.
- Over 58% covered symptoms and diagnosis, but less than 40% addressed etiology, pathology, surgery, postoperative course, or prognosis.
- 93.1% of websites were incomplete, 75.7% were accurate, and 97.7% were neutral or positive towards medical treatment.
- Websites for Pectus Excavatum (PE) were least accurate and often owned by lay individuals.
Conclusions:
- Online pediatric surgery information quality is highly variable.
- Lay-owned websites, common for the general audience, may not align with pediatric surgeons' opinions.
- An organized approach is needed to ensure accurate and complete online pediatric surgery information for parents.
