Evidence map›Paper›PMID 28500021›Full record

ArticleInteractive journal of medical research2017

Thoracic Surgery Information on the Internet: A Multilingual Quality Assessment.

Myles Davaris, Stephen Barnett, Robert Abouassaly, Nathan Lawrentschuk

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Interactive journal of medical research, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
5citing papers in PubMed
–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

5 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Adverse Effects of Radiotherapy and Chemotherapy for Common Malignancies: What Is the Quality of Information Patients Are Finding Online?Journal of cancer education : the official journal of the American Association for Cancer Education · 2021
    Article
  2. Radiation Oncology Online: Quality, Strategies, and Disparities.Journal of cancer education : the official journal of the American Association for Cancer Education · 2020
    Article
  3. Article
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Myles DavarisUniversity of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5651-9317
Stephen BarnettUniversity of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8350-2860
Robert AbouassalyUniversity Hospitals Case Medical Centre, Cleveland, OH, United States.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6897-6518
Nathan LawrentschukAustin Hospital, Department of Surgery, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8553-5618

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundPrevious data suggest that quality of Internet information regarding surgical conditions and their treatments is variable. However, no comprehensive analysis of website quality exists for thoracic surgery.

objectiveThe aim of this study was to quantify website quality in a multilingual setting using an international standard for assessment.

methodsHealth On the Net (HON) principles may be applied to websites using an automated toolbar function. We used the English, French, Spanish, and German Google search engines to identify 12,000 websites using keywords related to thoracic conditions and procedures. The first 150 websites returned by each keyword in each language were examined. We compared website quality to assess for tertile (is the quality better in first, second, or third 50 websites returned) and language differences. A further analysis of the English site types was undertaken performing a comparative analysis of website provider types.

resultsOverall, there are a considerable number of websites devoted to thoracic surgery: "lung cancer" returned over 150 million websites. About 7.85% (940/11,967) of websites are HON-accredited with differences by search term (P<.001) and tertiles (P<.001) of the first 150 websites, but not between languages. Oncological keywords regarding conditions and procedures were found to return a higher percentage of HON-accreditation. The percentage of HON-accredited sites was similar across all four languages (P=.77). In general, the first tertile contained a higher percentage of HON-accredited sites for every keyword.

conclusionsClinicians should appreciate the lack of validation of the majority of thoracic websites, with discrepancies in quality and number of websites across conditions and procedures. These differences appear similar regardless of language. An opportunity exists for clinicians to participate in the development of informative, ethical, and reliable health websites on the Internet and direct patients to them.

Indexed as

Internetlanguagemultilingualismthoracicwebsites

Identifiers

PMID28500021
PMCPMC5446665

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

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.