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J Hand Microsurg 2019; 11(02): 094-099
DOI: 10.1055/s-0038-1675887
Original Article
Thieme Medical and Scientific Publishers Private Ltd.

Factors Associated with the Quality of Online Information about Scapholunate Interosseous Ligament Insufficiency

Daniel Bakker
1   Department of Surgery and Perioperative Care, Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States
,
Janna S. E. Ottenhoff
1   Department of Surgery and Perioperative Care, Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States
,
David Ring
1   Department of Surgery and Perioperative Care, Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States
› Author Affiliations Funding None.
Further Information

Publication History

Received: 14 June 2018

Accepted after revision: 04 September 2018

Publication Date:
26 December 2018 (online)

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Abstract

Background The Internet is increasingly used by patients to seek health information about their medical conditions. The online information is of variable quality, often difficult to read, and sometimes inaccurate or misleading. This study assessed factors associated with the quality, readability, and dominant tones of online information about scapholunate interosseous ligament (SLIL) insufficiency.

Materials and Methods Using the three most used search engines, we entered the terms “wrist sprain,” “scapholunate ligament injury,” and “SL dissociation” and assessed the quality of the 45 Web sites identified using the DISCERN tool, readability by the Flesch Reading Ease Score, the Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level, the Gunning Fog Index, and the Simple Measure Of Gobbledygook, and dominant tones using the IBM Watson Tone Analyzer and the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count.

Results Online information about SLIL injuries had a mean DISCERN score of 39 ± 8.2. A dominant Web site tone of “sadness” correlated with lower DISCERN scores. A dominant tentative tone in text was associated with easier to comprehend texts.

Conclusion The online information regarding SLIL insufficiency is of generally low quality, limited readability, and the underlying tones may be misleading. Professional societies might consider efforts to provide appealing, readable, information about SLIL insufficiency and other less common diagnoses on the Internet.

Keywords

scapholunate insufficiency - SLIL - health information - Internet - quality control

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