Background
The burden of peripheral artery disease is significant for public health but the readily
available on-line information on the disease is poorly studied. This study seeks to
evaluate the quality and readability of patient resources and identify gaps that appear
in the top search results for peripheral artery disease.
Methods
Internet searches were performed for “PAD” and “Peripheral Artery Disease” and “PVD”
on three search engines and two metasearch engines. The top 30 websites from each
search engine were compiled, screened, and evaluated across four categories of information
to assess overall quality: accountability, interactivity, structure, and content.
Four indices were used to evaluate readability of the text for the viewer. Statistical
analyses was performed using Rstudio with ANOVA.
Results
Sixty-three websites met inclusion criteria, of which 25 were open access (34.9%),
30 were from hospital/healthcare organization (48%), 5 were from a governmental agency
(8%), 4 were industry sponsored (6%), and 2 were from professional medical societies
(3%). Median total quality score was 19 out of 47 (IQR, 15 –30): of the components
of this score, accountability was 5 out of 17 (2 –10), interactivity was 2 out of
5 (2.0 –2.0), site structure was 3 out of 4 (2.5 –3.0), and site content was 11 out
of 21 (7 –14). Total score varied significantly by organization type (P = 0.007). Open access (30, 17 –34, median, IQR) and governmental agency (30, 29 –31)
websites scored the highest while hospital/healthcare organization (16, 14v21) websites
scored the lowest. Overall readability was low with a median Flesch-Kincaid Grade
Level Score of 10.7 (IQR, 10 –12). Using this index, only one website (1.6%) was written
below the recommended 6th grade reading level.
Conclusion
Freely available online patient education materials for peripheral artery disease
are poor, have varying quality, and are largely written at a level higher than that
of an average US adult thus depriving the patient from understanding the existing
information. We recommend that the vascular surgery community re-examine the current
offering and provide improved readable websites to patients to facilitate patient
education and shared decision making.
Keywords
Abbreviations:
PAD (Peripheral Arterial Disease), PVD (Peripheral Vascular Disease), IQR (interquartile range)To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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Article Info
Publication History
Published online: January 04, 2022
Accepted:
December 19,
2021
Received in revised form:
December 11,
2021
Received:
November 7,
2021
Footnotes
Conflicts of interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Funding: This research received no specific grant support from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Identification
Copyright
© 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
