[An evaluation study of dementia information providing websites in Korea]

The present study purposed to investigate and analyze domestic websites providing information about dementia and to suggest future directions for the development of dementia-related websites.

For this purpose, the researcher selected 13 domestic websites that were available in November and December 2004, and evaluated them in terms of construction, operation, accessibility and contents on a scale 4 point (0~3).

The construction of dementia-related websites got 6-13 out of 18 points, which suggests that management policies for the operation of dementia-related websites are inadequate. The operation of dementia-related websites got 7-15 out of 24 points. In particular, all 13 sites got a low score in the aspect of continuance. With regard to accessibility, the sites were evaluated on how easily users could access the sites and they got 2-8 out of 15 points. In evaluating contents, the sites got 9-18 out of 21 points with regard to the purpose and appropriateness of the contents.

This shows that most sites did not provide diverse types of dementia-related information. Because it is highly advantageous to perform primary dementia-preventing management through websites, this study proposes to develop a website evaluation system in order to provide high quality dementia-related information.