Citation

Rose S, Bruce J, Maffulli N. Eur. J. Sports Traumatol. Relat. Res. 2001; 23(1): 9-13.

Affiliation

Department of Trauma/Orthopaedic Surgery, Keele University School of Medicine, North Staffordshire Hospital, Staffordshire ST4 7QB, United Kingdom

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, Kurtis)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

We wished to explore the volume and accessibility of information about anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) and meniscal injuries on the Internet. One hundred patients attending a Sports Trauma NHS outpatient clinic were surveyed to determine Internet use and to identify the terms that the patients used to describe their injuries. These search terms were used to conduct an extensive Internet search on five search engines for information about ACL and meniscal injuries. It emerged that 40% of patients attending outpatient clinic had searched the Internet. Over half of this patient group (58%) stated they would consider using the Internet to retrieve information about their medical condition. A total of 5947 web pages were accessed and categorised according to content. Only 393 (7%) pages contained information relevant to ACL and meniscal injuries. It appears that the number of patients using the Internet to retrieve information on their condition is increasing. As patients usually have no skills in information retrieval and the amount of information retrieved using layman's terms is negligible, their access to reliable and valid web sites containing medical information should be facilitated.

Language: en