Quality of information on female sterilisation on the Internet

Abstract

The Internet has a great potential to provide useful as well as useless or misleading information. To assess the quality of information available on-line on female sterilisation, we performed a search of the Internet using seven search engines. We set out to assess the first 10 sites found by each of the most frequently used search engines. Our search revealed 12 relevant Web sites, none of which complied with all of the criteria for quality. Our assessment focused on credibility and content of each Web site. Credibility was assessed by source which was described in nine Web sites, currency in five sites and review process in none. We assessed the content by hierarchy and accuracy of evidence which was fulfilled by five sites and one site respectively. This makes it difficult for a lay person to assess which Web sites provide accurate and useful information and which do not.