Evidence map›Paper›PMID 19390105›Full record

ArticleJournal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA

Seeking health information online: does Wikipedia matter?

Michaël R Laurent, Tim J Vickers

Abstract read
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Article in Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 88 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
88citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

88 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

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  6. Citations in Wikipedia for understanding research reach.Journal of the Medical Library Association : JMLA · 2024
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28 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Michaël R LaurentFaculty of Medicine, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (MRL), Belgium; Department of Molecular Microbiology, Washington University, School of Medicine (TJV), St. Louis, MO, USA.michael.laurent@gmail.com
Tim J Vickers

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

OBJECTIVE To determine the significance of the English Wikipedia as a source of online health information. DESIGN The authors measured Wikipedia's ranking on general Internet search engines by entering keywords from MedlinePlus, NHS Direct Online, and the National Organization of Rare Diseases as queries into search engine optimization software. We assessed whether article quality influenced this ranking. The authors tested whether traffic to Wikipedia coincided with epidemiological trends and news of emerging health concerns, and how it compares to MedlinePlus. MEASUREMENTS Cumulative incidence and average position of Wikipedia compared to other Web sites among the first 20 results on general Internet search engines (Google, Google UK, Yahoo, and MSN, and page view statistics for selected Wikipedia articles and MedlinePlus pages. RESULTS Wikipedia ranked among the first ten results in 71-85% of search engines and keywords tested. Wikipedia surpassed MedlinePlus and NHS Direct Online (except for queries from the latter on Google UK), and ranked higher with quality articles. Wikipedia ranked highest for rare diseases, although its incidence in several categories decreased. Page views increased parallel to the occurrence of 20 seasonal disorders and news of three emerging health concerns. Wikipedia articles were viewed more often than MedlinePlus Topic (p = 0.001) but for MedlinePlus Encyclopedia pages, the trend was not significant (p = 0.07-0.10). CONCLUSIONS Based on its search engine ranking and page view statistics, the English Wikipedia is a prominent source of online health information compared to the other online health information providers studied.

Indexed as

Consumer Health InformationInformation ServicesInternetHumansInformation Storage and RetrievalMedlinePlus

Identifiers

PMID19390105
PMCPMC2705249

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.