A Readability Assessment of Online Stroke Information

Background: Patients and carers increasingly access the Internet as a source of health information. Poor health literacy is extremely common and frequently limits patient's comprehension of health care information literature. We aimed to assess the readability of online consumer-orientated stroke information using 2 validated readability measures.Methods: The 100 highest Google ranked consumer-oriented stroke Web pages were assessed for reading difficulty using the Flesch–Kincaid and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) formulae.Results: None of the included Web pages complied with the current readability guidelines when readability was measured using the gold standard SMOG formula. Mean Flesch–Kincaid grade level was 10.4 (95% confidence interval [CI] 9.97-10.9) and mean SMOG grade 12.1 (95% CI 11.7-12.4). Over half of the Web pages were produced at graduate reading levels or above. Not-for-profit Web pages were significantly easier to read (P = .0006). The Flesch–Kincaid formula significantly underestimated reading difficulty, with a mean underestimation of 1.65 grades (95% CI 1.49-1.81), P 
Source: Journal of Stroke and Cerebrovascular Diseases - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: Original Articles Source Type: research