Evaluating Medical Resources About Alternative Medicine

There are literally thousands of medical sites – or those that purport to be about medicine – on the internet, and more everyday. Some of them are created to sell a product, others are created to inform patients, and still others exist as a clearinghouse of information and interaction between patients and practitioners.

When you’re doing research about your medical condition, and especially on alternative medicine and complementary treatments, it’s important to evaluate those medical resources for accuracy and slant. The following ten criteria are standards that are often used to help form an opinion of how trustworthy the information presented is.

1. Who runs this site?
It should be immediately clear who runs the web site on which you find your information. Every page should have a link to a ‘contact us’ or ‘about us’ page, as well as a link to the home page of the web site. If it’s not clear who runs a web site, treat info found on it skeptically.

2. Who pays for the site?
Often the people who run the site are not the people who pay for it, or sponsor it. Sometimes the domain name can give you that information. Addresses ending in .edu, for instance, are educational institutions, and those ending in .gov are sponsored by the U.S. Government. Knowing who’s footing the bill can tell you a lot about the information that’s presented. If the web site is sponsored by a drug company, for instance, it may affect the slant of the information that’s presented on the web site.

3. What is the purpose of the site?
You’ll often find a mission statement or a statement of purpose if there is an “About Us” page. The purpose of the site can help you decide how trustworthy the information on the site is.

4. Where does the information come from?
Many health sites simply repost information that is collected from other web sites. The source of any information that wasn’t created by the organization that owns and operates the web site, it should be clearly marked with its original source.

5. What is the information based on?
All facts and figures given on the cite should have references to articles in medical journals or other sources. Opinion and advice should be differentiated from evidence based information.

6. How do they choose what to publish?
Is there an editorial review board of experts who read information to be sure that it’s accurate? Is it periodically reviewed to make sure that it remains true?

7. Is the information up to date?
Medical information changes frequently. It’s important to know when the information posted on a web site was last updated or reviewed. Even if the information hasn’t changed, the date that it was last reviewed for accuracy should be posted clearly so that you know that it’s been reviewed recently to ensure that it’s still accurate.

8. How does the site choose links to other sites?
Take a look at the links from a web site. Do they link to any other web sites at all? If so, are the sites chosen valid medical resources? Are they linked to anyone that asks – or pays for – a link?

9. What information about you does the site collect, and why?
Any site that collects personal information must have a privacy policy that tells you how they’ll use the data that they collect. Be sure to read the privacy policy to learn what data they collect about you and why.

10. Can you contact the site owners?
Look for contact information. The site should have email addresses that you can use to problems, ask questions and give feedback. If there are chat rooms or message boards, the site should have a terms of service statement.