Efforts to better assess the quality of health information on the Internet continue. An increasing body of literature now exists that present quality rating instruments. By 2005, Bernstam EV et al report a total of 273 distinct instruments, with 80 providing evaluation criteria. The Health Sciences Library (HSL) of New York Medical College checklist below includes the basic elements common to all with the Health Summit Working Group policy paper at the core. It is intended to serve as a basic guide or template for students, faculty, researchers or public health professionals when viewing or evaluating specific Internet sites. The IQ tool also provides a structured way to test individual sites. |
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| Basic
Criteria |
Authorship/sponsorship or developers |
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Authority of source explicit;
bias or balance points of view clear |
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Credibility, context or setting
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Content |
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Information quality and accuracy,
source of knowledge/expertise, level or hierarchy of evidence, stated criteria
for inclusion |
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Currency |
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Content dated, frequency of update
and maintenance of the site |
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Disclosure |
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Nature of sponsorship, authorship,
and potential conflicts of interest clear |
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Audience |
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Organization, design and instructions
reflect the targeted audience in terms of reading level, language, use of
images, etc. |
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Accessibility, design and ease of use |
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Logical organization, can be used
by the lowest common denominator of current browser technology, plug-ins
where appropriate and an internal search engine |
