Background
Methods
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Available in English
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Freely accessible (i.e. non-commercial with no cost to users or membership fees)
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That described itself as being intended for patients and the public
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Broad in scope (not limited to specific conditions or types of treatments)
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Explicitly based on systematic reviews (i.e. there had to be a description of how the information is prepared and the description had to include a statement about using systematic reviews)
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The stated purpose
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A statement that information about treatment effects is based on systematic reviews
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Availability of links to the systematic reviews
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Reporting size of effects
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Availability of links to ongoing trials
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Information about how up-to-date information about treatment effects is
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What other information is provided
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What tools there are for searching, sorting, and filtering information
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Use of plain language (i.e. summaries written for patients and the public) and the availability of a glossary
Original question | Our question | Condition | Treatment | Initial search terms |
---|---|---|---|---|
When should I see a doctor about......a backache? | Should I do exercises for my backache? | backache | exercise | • backache • exercise for backache • “back pain” • “back pain” AND exercise |
Are the new birth control pills that eliminate your periods really safe? | Are period suppressing birth control pills safe? | birth control | period suppressing birth control pills | • period suppressing birth control pills • period suppressing “birth control pills” • “oral contraception” |
Flu shots—should I or shouldn’t I? | Should I get a flu shot? | flu | flu shots | • flu shot • influenza vaccine |
When should I see a doctor about...... muscle and joint pain? | Should I get my osteoarthritic knee replaced? | osteoarthritis of the knee | knee replacement | • knee replacement • surgery for osteoarthritis of the knee • osteoarthritis AND “knee replacement” |
Will vitamin D save my life? Should I really be taking four times the recommended daily dose? | Should I take vitamin D to prevent osteoporosis? | osteoporosis | vitamin D | • vitamin D for osteoporosis • “vitamin D” AND osteoporosis |
Will staring at a computer all day make me blind? | Should I stop using phone, tablet, computer, and TV screens before going to bed? | sleep problems | phone, tablet, computer, and TV screens | • computers and sleep problems • screens and sleep problems • computers AND insomnia • screens AND insomnia |
When should I see a doctor about......a sore throat? | Should I take antibiotics for my sore throat? | sore throat | antibiotics | • sore throat • antibiotics for sore throat • “sore throat” AND antibiotics |
How often do I really need to have my teeth professionally cleaned? | How often should I get dental check-ups? | tooth decay | dental checks | • dental checks • dental check-ups • routine dental check-ups |
Results
Website | Statements about how the information is prepared |
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Better Health Channel | "We provide health and medical information to improve the health and wellbeing of people and the communities they live in. This information is: • quality-assured and reliable • up-to-date • locally relevant • easy to understand." “We use a rigorous quality assurance and approval process to develop and review our content, including consultation and input from subject matter experts, overview by the BHC Editorial team and referral to other areas of the Victorian Department of Health as required. Our content partners are subject matter experts from a wide range of reputable Australian health, medical and academic organisations.” |
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - Diseases & Conditions | Content source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Page maintained by: Office of Associate Director of Communication, Division of Public Affairs There are also sections on Healthy Living and Travellers’ Health. No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
Clear Health from NIH | "Clear Health from NIH Easy, accessible information and more... If you or someone close to you has received a recent diagnosis, or if you are curious because you heard about a disease, disorder, or condition on the news or from friends and want a good place to find the basic information you are looking for, this is a good place to get started …" No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
Cleveland Clinic, Health Library | “Access thousands of health articles, videos and tools to help manage your health” No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
Derby Teaching Hospitals, NHS, Patient information publications, | “In this area you will be able to access our patient information publications on a range of conditions, procedures and services.” No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
Diseases | Government of Canada “Find information, tools and facts about symptoms, risks and how to prevent, treat and manage human diseases and illnesses.” No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
East and North Hertfordshire, NHS, Patient information leaflets | “Our patient information leaflets are not meant to replace the information, advice and support provided to you by our staff but they may help answer some of your questions or help you think about questions you would like to ask your doctor or nurse” No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
“Familydoctor.org is the AAFP’s [American Academy of Family Physicians] award-winning consumer website, featuring physician-reviewed patient education materials, that includes care for the physical, mental, and emotional health of the whole family from newborns to older adults.” “Content is created by family doctors or professional writers/editors/producers who have relevant experience developing health content for patients.” "Content is reviewed by a medical review panel of family doctors to ensure that the information: • Is medically accurate, complete, and useful • Adheres to the best available evidence-based medicine, as well as AAFP policies and clinical practice guidelines • Expresses a family medicine perspective" | |
Health A-Z | “The Health A-Z is an online database of over 600 health conditions and treatments that will support everyone living in Ireland to be well informed about their health, and that of their loved ones. The Health A-Z has been developed by the HSE’s National Clinical Programmes based on content shared by the NHS in the UK.” “NHS Choices provides open public access to a wide range of UK health information and services. NHS Choices have generously provided the baseline content used in our Health A-Z without cost to the Irish health service.” |
Healthdirect | “The healthdirect team delivers comprehensive content that is clinically safe, appropriate, current and accessible, easy to understand and digest, engaging, and visually appealing.” "healthdirect editorial oversight occurs at two levels: 1. Strategic development of new services and features is managed by the Healthdirect Australia Digital Services team to ensure usability and overall quality of the website and its content. 2. Content development is overseen by the Clinical Governance team to ensure all health and clinical related content is safe, appropriate and current." “A large proportion of healthdirect’s content is comprised of links to quality information on partner websites.” “In addition to providing links to quality information on partner websites, our in-house team of health professionals, journalists and content producers create and publish our own locally-developed content. This content is reviewed for clinical accuracy every 1–4 years, depending on subject matter, and ‘Last reviewed’ dates are clearly stated on individual pages.” |
Healthline | “You can depend on us to provide expert content” “Healthline’s medical reviewers ensure that our content is accurate, current, and user-focused. Along with extensive experience in a variety of medical specialties, they bring added perspective due to their backgrounds in clinical practice, research, and patient advocacy.” |
HealthLinkBC | “In this section, there are information topics about some of the most common health concerns, so it is easy for you to find what you are looking for as quickly as possible.” “Our website provides medically-approved information on more than 5000 health and nutrition topics, symptoms, and interactive health tools and tips for maintaining a healthy lifestyle.” “The content on our website is created, reviewed, and updated by a variety of sources. This includes subject matter experts across the province, service providers, our internal clinical team, our team of registered dietitians, and our knowledgebase supplier Healthwise®.” |
Health Navigator | “we go to great lengths to ensure our website provides you with the reliable, New Zealand-focused health information you are seeking.” “The quality of information on the internet is highly variable. One of the key goals of this website is to make it easier for you to find trustworthy and reliable health information. As well as writing our own content, we link to existing resources from other reputable organisations.” “Evidence bases – where possible information is based on evidence-based clinical and self management guidelines, or where these do not exist, on best or promising practice” |
Mayo Clinic Patient Care and Health Information | “After the team agrees on the topic of a content piece, our writers, assisted by editorial researchers, gather best-available source materials for the topic. Best-available source materials vary by topic and may include published medical literature, evidence-based guidelines, or a Mayo Clinic physician or scientist who has distinct interest, training and expertise in the topic.” “The team follows a standardized procedure for selecting, documenting and verifying best-available medical literature, and storing references.” |
MedlinePlus | “MedlinePlus is the National Institutes of Health’s Web site for patients and their families and friends. Produced by the National Library of Medicine, the world’s largest medical library, it brings you information about diseases, conditions, and wellness issues in language you can understand. MedlinePlus offers reliable, up-to-date health information, anytime, anywhere, for free.” "MedlinePlus is designed to help you find appropriate, authoritative health information. To do this, we provide access to information produced by the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health, such as searches of MEDLINE/PubMed, our database that indexes medical research literature, and ClinicalTrials.gov, the database of clinical research studies conducted at the National Institutes of Health and many other institutions worldwide. We also provide you with a database of full-text drug and supplement information, an illustrated medical encyclopedia, a medical dictionary, and the latest health news. In addition, MedlinePlus contains pages that link to other Web sites. For example, we have Health Topic pages for over 1000 diseases and conditions from Alzheimer’s Disease to Zika Virus. We focus on organizing publications produced by the NIH Institutes and other Federal Government organizations. We also link to other Web sites, particularly ones with unique information or special features such as diagrams, glossaries, or format tailored to particular user needs." |
“This site was built by the Alberta Government and Alberta Health Services to give Albertans one place to go for health information they can trust. Healthcare experts across the province make sure the information is correct, up to date, and written for people who live in Alberta.” “Content Written by Healthwise: Healthwise develops content through the collaborative efforts of content and medical teams using a comprehensive research and review process.” "The Healthwise® Knowledgebase contains thousands of unique references to help readers find more information on topics. Our processes and policies ensure that entry points of content give readers reasonable access to references. We include citations that: • Support statistics, particularly those that play a key role in decision making. • Support outcomes, effectiveness, or risk data. • Identify testing or treatment recommendations or guidelines. • Support prevalence data." | |
NHS Choices | “The evidence-based knowledge that informs all NHS Choices content is derived from peer-reviewed scientific research and from the direct experience of clinicians, other health professionals, patients and the wider public. In pulling together this knowledge to provide users with a rounded and balanced package of material on a particular subject, NHS Choices requires its journalists to consult the following resources: For peer-reviewed scientific research, they consult NHS Evidence, which has developed a system for accrediting and classifying different types of research evidence with respect to its quality.” |
NHS inform | “NHS inform is Scotland’s national health information service. Our aim is to provide the people in Scotland with accurate and relevant information to help them make informed decisions about their own health and the health of the people they care for.” “All of the websites linked to from NHS inform have passed our quality assurance process. We use a range of criteria to decide if a website is suitable for inclusion, including if it’s: • free to access without a need to login or register • relevant to a Scottish audience • evidence based • updated every 12 months” “We know how important it is to create original content that reflects the healthcare needs of the Scottish population. To help us with this, we work with individuals, groups and organisations from different areas of health and social care policy and practice in Scotland to: • identify requirements • coordinate information gathering and production • provide fact checking and sign-off • agree governance arrangements” |
NPS Medicinewise - Medical Info | “Evidence-based resources, insights and information to improve the health of all Australians.” “We provide guidance and direction on the safe and wise use of medicines and health technologies so that people stay healthier and the cost of care remains affordable. We connect and deliver meaningful information for health consumers, health professionals, government, research and other businesses to enable the best decisions about medicines, health technologies and other health choices for better health and economic outcomes. Evidence-based information is transformed into behaviour change services, digital health and data insights and knowledge transfer products.” How we do it https://www.nps.org.au/about-us#how-we-do-it “We work synergistically and in partnership with peak health organisations and government, connecting health consumers and health professionals with evidence-based resources and tools to improve the health of all Australians. We connect people with our behaviour change services, digital health and data insights and knowledge transfer products, and our work is rigorously evaluated to demonstrate impact and inform continuous improvement. We believe that well-informed health professionals and a health-savvy population are key to achieving better health and economic outcomes.” |
Patient | “Patient is the web’s leading independent health platform, established for 20 years. With more than 18 million visits a month, it is a trusted source of information for both patients and health professionals across the globe. The site contains over 4000 health information leaflets and thousands of discussion forums. It is accredited by The Information Standard, NHS England’s quality mark and was listed as ‘The top health website you can’t live without’ by The Times newspaper (Jan 2013).” “The editorial team are employed to create accurate and up-to-date content reflecting reliable research evidence, guidance and best clinical practice.” |
Patient Information | “Annals of Internal Medicine’s “Summaries for Patients” “Summaries for Patients” are brief, non-technical summaries of studies and clinical guidelines published in Annals of Internal Medicine. The Summaries aim to explain these published articles to people who are not health care providers.” Annals of Internal Medicine’s “Patient Information Pages” ““Patient Information Pages” provide general information for the public about a common health condition. Patient Information Pages accompany each of Annals’ monthly In the Clinic feature. The pages include information about other sources for good information about the condition.” |
Patient Information | “Explore the latest patient information from The JAMA Network, including easy-to-understand information about prevention and management of common illnesses.” No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
Penn Medicine, Patient Information, Conditions (A-Z) | No information is provided about how the information is prepared. |
WebMD | “The content that we produce and the news that we feature is determined by our staff of physicians and medical journalists. It contains the latest information from reliable sources including the most important peer-reviewed medical journals, announcements from federal health agencies, and analyses on the latest health trends. Our experienced health reporters talk daily with prominent medical leaders, providing in-depth analyses, updates, and profiles that give our health news and content a perspective found nowhere else. Every original article is reviewed by our staff of full-time, board-certified physician editors.” |
Wikipedia | “The English-language Wikipedia was estimated in 2014 to hold around 25,000 articles on health-related topics [3]. Across Wikipedia encyclopedias in all languages there were 155,000 health articles using 950,000 citations to sources and which collectively received 4.8 billion pageviews in 2013 [4]. This amount of traffic makes Wikipedia one of the most consulted health resources in the world, or perhaps the most consulted resource [4]” “A collaboration between Cochrane and Wikipedia provides access to the Cochrane Library for the purposes of incorporating their review information into Wikipedia articles.” “Ideal sources for biomedical assertions include general or systematic reviews in reliable, third-party, published sources, such as reputable medical journals, widely recognised standard textbooks written by experts in a field, or medical guidelines and position statements from nationally or internationally reputable expert bodies. It is vital that the biomedical information in all types of articles be based on reliable, third-party, published sources and accurately reflect current medical knowledge.” |
Website | Statements about how the information is prepared |
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Epistemonikos | “world’s largest systematic review database, curated and annotated by our network of collaborators.” “Articles are connected, so you can easily move from any article to all the evidence answering the same question.” “multilingual foolproof search tools” “Epistemonikos is aimed to health professionals, researchers and health decision-makers. It is not intended for the general public, even though it has been used by well-informed lay people and journalists successfully.” |
Evidence search, NICE National Institute for Health and Care Excellence | “Evidence search provides access to selected and authoritative evidence in health, social care and public health.” “Sources include: British National Formulary, Clinical Knowledge Summaries, SIGN, the Cochrane Library and Royal Colleges, Social Care Online and GOV.UK.” Has filters for “Systematic Reviews” and for “Information for the Public”, but it is not possible to filter or search for information for the public that is based on systematic reviews. |
PubMed | “PubMed comprises more than 27 million citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books. Citations may include links to full-text content from PubMed Central and publisher web sites.” |
The Cochrane Library | “The Cochrane Library (ISSN 1465–1858) is a collection of six databases that contain different types of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making”: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Cochrane Methodology Register, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects, Health Technology Assessment Database, NHS Economic Evaluation Database. |
Trip (Turning Research Into Practice) | “Trip medical database, a smart, fast tool to find high quality clinical research evidence.” “Millions of articles items indexed & uniquely ranked” "Trip is a clinical search engine designed to allow users to quickly and easily find and use high-quality research evidence to support their practice and/or care. Trip has been online since 1997 and in that time has developed into the internet’s premier source of evidence-based content. Our motto is ‘Find evidence fast’ and this is something we aim to deliver for every single search. As well as research evidence we also allow clinicians to search across other content types including images, videos, patient information leaflets, educational courses and news." “Our most recent survey indicated that approximately 70% of our users were clinicians and 30% were non-clinical e.g. information specialists, patients or carers. Of the 70% of clinician users about 50% were doctors with an even split between primary and secondary care.” |
Website | Statements about how the information is prepared & status of the website |
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CureFacts | “CureFacts provides a scientific based rating of all types of medical treatments. Our rating is mainly based on statistical summaries of all valid clinical trials. Such summaries, called Systematic Reviews, provide the highest level of evidence regarding the safety and effectiveness of treatments.” “We provide everyone with free access to a reliable and user-friendly information about the effectiveness and safety of medical treatments and procedures of all types: surgeries, prescription and non-prescription drugs, medical devices, vitamins, minerals, food supplements, alternative medicine and diagnostic tests.” “CureFacts relies primarily on Systematic Reviews, which are done by independent organizations and researchers, and summarize all valid clinical trials, and therefore are regarded as the most reliable type of scientific evidence. This sets us apart from other online resources, which usually rely on only one clinical trial, or on regulation guidelines that may be influenced by conflict of interest and by lobbying.” “Systematic Reviews summarize all valid clinical trials, and therefore provide the most reliable information about the effectiveness of medical treatments. However, when a treatment is introduced to the market and used by many patients, new safety issues, that were not previously detected in clinical trials (and therefore were not covered by Systematic Reviews) may arise. Therefore, we use additional sources to include known side effects and safety issues related to specific treatments. In a similar manner, we receive continuous feedback from doctors and healthcare providers, and use it to improve our database.” “We are currently running our Alpha version for which the access is limited and requires registration and then permission via email. Following further testing, we will open it to the public, and you will be able to use it without registration. You will need to register, however, if you want to keep your records (medical treatments that you want to save) and preferences (so that we can suggest treatments that people like you prefer), or if you wish to get our newsletter, [notifications] and updates.” “Currently, CureFacts has no sources of income. We are creating the first ever evidence based medicine platform, a meeting point for science, patients and doctors. In the future, we will provide you with a list of healthcare providers, doctors and on-line consultants; in turn, these doctors and consultants may pay us referral fees. This will enable us to maintain our operation, and to provide free access to all, while keeping us neutral and objective (since we will not gain anything when you choose a specific medical treatment).” |
Website |
Cochrane Evidence
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Informed Health
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PubMed Health
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Link to information about the website | |||
Stated purpose | “Cochrane Reviews are systematic reviews of primary research in human health care and health policy, and are internationally recognized as the highest standard in evidence-based health care resources. They investigate the effects of interventions for prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation.” “We are working to make this evidence accessible here on cochrane.org by creating summaries of these systematic review findings.” | “InformedHealth.org is the English-language version of the German website Gesundheitsinformation.de. By publishing this bilingual website, the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG, Germany) fulfils part of its legal mandate to educate the public in matters of health. The website addresses both patients and (healthy) consumers by offering a wide range of different topics.” | “PubMed Health specializes in systematic reviews of clinical effectiveness research. We include:” • Plain language summaries and abstracts of Cochrane reviews • Abstracts (short technical summaries) of systematic reviews in DARE, the Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects—many of them with a critical summary of the review • Full texts of reviews froma growing group of public agencies • Information developed by public agencies for consumers and clinicians that is based on systematic reviews • Methods resources about the best research and statistical techniques for systematic reviews and clinical effectiveness research “In May 2016, there were over 40,000 systematic reviews at PubMed Health.” |
Based on systematic reviews Is information about the treatment effects based on systematic reviews? |
Yes
| Yes (“mainly”) “Research summaries: These are objective, brief summaries of the latest findings on a research question described in the title. They usually summarize the results of studies, for instance the results of one or (rarely) several systematic reviews or IQWiG reports. They also describe the study/studies in more detail and explain how the researchers came to their conclusions.” “We mainly use systematic reviews of studies to answer questions about the benefits and harms of medical interventions.” |
Yes
|
Links to systematic reviews Are there links to the systematic reviews of treatment effects? |
Yes
| Yes (when used as a Source) |
Yes
|
Size of effects Is information provided about the size of effects or balance between benefits and harms? |
Inconsistent
a
|
Yes
a
|
Inconsistent
a
|
Certainty of the evidence Is information provided about the certainty of the evidence about treatment effects? |
Inconsistent
There is inconsistent use of headings and content in the summaries. |
Inconsistent
The certainty of the evidence is not reported consistently. |
Inconsistent
There is inconsistent use of headings and content in the plain language summaries and the technical summaries. |
Links to ongoing trials Does the website provide links to registered/ongoing clinical trials? |
No
|
No
|
No
|
Updating Isinformation provided about how up-to-date information about treatment effects is? |
Yes
Date of publication included for all summaries. Date of last search provided for some, but not all. |
Yes
Updated and Next update dates on every page. Date of publication for Sources. Date of last search not reported. |
Yes
Date of publication is available for all reviews. Date of last search provided for some, but not all. |
Other information Is other information provided? |
No
The summaries include some background information, the authors’ conclusions, and links to other summaries that may be of interest. |
Yes
Symptoms, causes, outlook, diagnosis, everyday life, learn more, extras |
Yes
Three books for the general public on understanding research results, some other methods resources, Behind the Headlines, and some background information |
Navigation What tools are there for searching, sorting, and filtering information? | Simple search (possible to use Boolean logic)b Sort by relevance, alphabetical, or date Filter by health topics, or new and updated | Simple search (not possible to use Boolean logic)b Sort by relevance or date Filter by topic areas or alphabetical | Simple search (possible to use Boolean logic)b Sorted by date of publication Filters for Article types, when information was added to PubMed Health, Content providers, and Reviews with a quality assessment It is also possible to search using the glossary (“Health A-Z”) which includes links to summaries for consumers. |
Jargon Is there a glossary or are there explanations of research and medical terms? | Plain language summaries with some variability in how well written they are. Pop-up definitions for some research and medical terms (not links to longer explanations). Glossary of terms relevant for Cochrane Reviews, not medical terms.b | Plain language information written for patients and the public. Hyperlinks to background information (not pop-up definitions). Glossary of “medical and scientific” terms (few research terms included). | There are no plain language summaries for most of the 40,000+ systematic reviews. Hyperlinks to information in the glossary (not pop-up definitions). Glossary of terms (“Health A-Z”) that includes both medical and research terms. |
Advantages What are the main advantages of the website? | Plain language summaries of a large number of systematic reviews of treatment effects translated to several other languages. | Wide range of topics with evidence-based information about treatment effects together with other information for patients and the public. | A large number of systematic reviews of treatment effects with plain language summaries for Cochrane reviews and some additional reviews, and an extensive glossary. |
Disadvantages What are the main disadvantages of the website? | Inconsistent reporting. No other information (besides treatment effects). | Inconsistent reporting and certainty of the evidence is not reported. | Inconsistent reporting. Most reviews do not have plain language summaries. |
Suggestions for the website How could the website be improved? | Use consistent headings and consistently report benefits and harms (or the lack of evidence), quantitative effect estimates, and the certainty of the evidence (using GRADE [21] or a similar approach) and include links to explanations about what the grades mean. Provide information about Cochrane Evidence policies and how summaries are prepared on the website and make this information easier to find. Add links to other information for patients and the public or include relevant information in the plain language summaries. Add a search tool that is specific for Cochrane Evidence (rather than for the entire Cochrane.org website, and improve the search (including removal of OR between words as the default). Improve the glossary and make it easier to find, use pop-up definitions more consistently, and include links to longer explanations. | Use consistent headings and consistently report benefits and harms (or the lack of evidence), quantitative effect estimates, and the certainty of the evidence (using GRADE [21] or a similar approach) and include links to explanations about what the grades mean. Standard explicit reporting of when information about treatment effects is based on a systematic review and when one was not available. Include date of last search. Use pop-up definitions and include more research terms (e.g. GET-IT). Improve the search tool so that it is easier to find information. Make it possible to use Boolean logic in searches. | Make it easier to browse. Use pop-up definitions. Add links to other information for patients and the public. |
Suggestions for all three websites | Provide simple instructions regarding the use of Boolean logic and the use of quotations to limit searches Include links to ongoing trials | ||
Tips for users How should the website be used by someone looking for information about treatment effects? | This website offers quick access to plain language summaries of over 7000 systematic reviews. Access to the full systematic reviews is free for all of the reviews in many countries and to some reviews (ones that are more than 1-year old or that have paid open access) everywhere. However, the quality of the summaries (and underlying systematic reviews) varies, and the navigation tools are rudimentary, sometimes making it hard to find information. Cochrane plain language summaries also can be found in PubMed Health and information about treatment effects is frequently based on Cochrane Reviews in Informed Health. | This website provides plain language information about the effects of treatments that is mainly based on systematic reviews together with other information for a large number of conditions. However, it can be difficult to find information. Research summaries are found for some, but not all treatments. | This website offers access to over 40,000 summaries of systematic reviews, some of which (over 8000) include plain language summaries. Access to some of the full systematic reviews is free. It also includes an extensive glossary with both medical and research terms. However, the quality of the summaries (and underlying systematic reviews) varies. There are many more reviews than in Cochrane Evidence, but most do not include plain language summaries. |
Tips for all three websites | Limit searches by using Boolean logic (inserting AND between terms (e.g. for the condition and for the treatment) and quotation marks (to indicate that words need to be next to each other; e.g. “back pain”. Use OR between different terms for the condition or between different terms for the treatment (e.g. “knee replacement” OR surgery) to expand searches. Consider searching Epistemonikos if you are unable to find trustworthy information (based on a systematic review) about the effects of treatments of interest using these databases. Cochrane reviews can also be found in Epistemonikos, a free-access database that contains scientific summaries for over 100,000 systematic reviews (not all of treatment effects) and plain language summaries for some reviews. Most if not all of the reviews in PubMed Health also can be found in Epistemonikos, It may be easier to search than PubMed Health and it includes translations to several other languages. However, it is not intended for patients and the public. Consider searching for links to ongoing trials, if there is important uncertainty about the effects of relevant treatments, using the World Health Organization International Clinical Trials Registry Platform Search Portal, NHS Choices or a clinical trials registry. |