Asthma Allergy Immunology

Asthma Allergy Immunology

2016, Vol 14, Num, 2     (Pages: 064-070)

How Reliable is the Information in the Internet on Atopic Dermatitis?

Petek Uzay Çetinkaya 1, Hakan Güvenir 2, Erol Çetinkaya 1, Can Naci KOCABAŞ 3,

1 Muğla Sıtkı Koçman Üniversitesi, Tıp Fakültesi Çocuk Sağlığı ve Hastalıkları Anabilim Dalı, Muğla, Türkiye
2 Ankara Çocuk Sağlığı ve Hastalıkları Hematoloji Onkoloji Eğitim ve Araştırma Hastanesi, Çocuk İmmünolojisi ve Allerji Hastalıkları Kliniği, Ankara, Türkiye
3 Muğla Sıtkı Koçman Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Çocuk İmmünolojisi ve Allerji Hastalıkları Bilim Dalı, Muğla, Türkiye

DOI: 10.21911/aai.5054
Viewed: 1039
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Downloaded : 398

Objective: The Internet is a very widely used information source and frequently used to obtain information about health, in particular. The aim of this study was to investigate, with reference to the international guidelines, the contents of Turkish web pages, prepared to provide information about atopic dermatitis (AD).

Materials and Methods: The web sites evaluated in this study were obtained through the search engine http://www.google.com. tr/, using the keywords atopic dermatitis and eczema. Sites were classified according to their source and were examined in terms of definition, diagnostic methods, and treatment recommendations with reference to the international guidelines.

Results: In the analysis according to source, most of the pages (29%) were blog/forum pages, prepared by unknown persons, and personal physician pages (22%). While the proportion of sites with video information was 6%, the proportion of social networking sites was 2%. In the analysis according to their content, complete and accurate information in terms of diagnosis and treatment of AD were found in child health and disease and child allergy and immunology specialist personal pages, the page of associations and the Internet encyclopedia Wikipedia. While the most accurate treatment approaches were non-pharmacological treatment (17%) and prophylactic treatment (25%), topical medications were defined in an insufficient number of sites. The number of sites with proposals of alternative medicine was found to be quite high (28%).

Conclusion: Despite the large number of Internet sites providing information on atopic dermatitis, many sites were not based on medical resources, and there was a lot of content that was incomplete or incorrect, mainly involving reviews by users. We believe that Internet sites need to be reviewed for their content and the existing information needs to be improved in terms of reliability and timeliness.

Keywords : Atopic dermatitis, eczema, internet, Google