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The readability of Prehospital Care Research Forum abstracts
J E Gough1, K E Misulis, L H Brown
1East Carolina University, School of Medicine, Greenville, NC, USA.
Objective:
The Prehospital Care Research Forum sponsors both oral and poster presentations of emergency medical services (EMS) research in conjunction with JEMS Corporation's annual EMS Today Conference. Attendance at the research presentations, historically, has been poor. This descriptive study was designed to measure the readability of the Prehospital Care Research Forum abstracts in order to determine whether the abstracts are difficult to read, and thus are a deterrent to attendance at the oral and poster research presentations.
Methods:
The 31 abstracts published in the 1995 Prehospital Care Research Forum supplement to the Journal of Emergency Medical Services were analyzed using a computerized reading-level testing program. Six different reading-level tests were used to determine the readability of the abstracts.
Results:
The overall reading level for the 31 abstracts ranged from grade 7 to grade 20, with a mean grade level of 12.3. The mean Flesch reading ease score for the 31 abstracts ranged from 3.4 to 66.1, with a mean score of 36.0 +/- 14.4.
Conclusion:
The abstracts for the Prehospital Care Research Forum presentations are not overly difficult to read. It is unlikely that readability of the abstracts is a factor in the interest, or lack of interest, in the proceedings of the Prehospital Care Research Forum.