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Take care with breast cancer information on the web
A recent study published in Cancer suggests that most breast cancer data found online is accurate, but sites featuring complementary and alternative medicine are significantly more likely to contain false or misleading health information.
More patients apparently seek health information online than through their own doctors, so researchers at the Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center used a series of criteria to analyse the accuracy of information on breast cancer in web pages. This is part of a study to determine whether or not existing quality assessment tools can be used to identify false or misleading breast cancer information online.
Researchers retrieved 343 web pages using search engines used by consumers and reviewed them for 15 quality criteria such as whether or not the author of the article was shown, the date that the article was writtena and its last modification. They found that about 41 of the 343 web pages contained inaccurate information.
According to one of the researchers, the patients who come to her for their first consultation are often very well information about breast cancer, although they may have information on treatments that are not applicable to their specific case. They may also have found information that worries them unecessarily. Interestingly, the study found that information on breast cancer on the web is generally more accurate than information on other fields of health.
Researchers were not able to find a specific set of criteria that patients could potentially use to screen web sites for accuracy, so their advice is to be cautious and rely on further information from their own practitioner.
