bims-librar 2019-04-21 papers

bims-librar

Biomed News

on Biomedical librarianship

Issue of 2019‒04‒21
fourteen papers selected by
Thomas Krichel
Open Library Society

The Quality of Information on Combined Oral Contraceptives Available on the Internet.
Readability, content, quality and accuracy assessment of internet-based patient education materials relating to labor analgesia.
Ghostwriting in biomedicine: a review of the published literature.
Interactive biomedical ontology matching.
"Is this a STD? Please help!": Online Information Seeking for Sexually Transmitted Diseases on Reddit.
Web-Based Health Information Technology: Access Among Latinos Varies by Subgroup Affiliation.
The Roles of Education, Literacy, and Numeracy in Need for Health Information during the Second Half of Adulthood: A Moderated Mediation Analysis.
Evaluating the Quality and Readability of Online Resources for Labiaplasty.
Searching for a Better Online Reputation.
What we know about media communication on antibiotics and antimicrobial resistance: A systematic review of the scientific literature.
Evaluating the Effect of Educational Interventions on Health Literacy through Social Networking Services to Promote Students' Quality of Life.
Status Quo of Professional⁻Patient Relations in the Internet Era: Bibliometric and Co-Word Analyses.
Google searches and detection of conjunctivitis epidemics worldwide.
Improving university students' web savvy: An intervention study.

J Obstet Gynaecol Can. 2019 Apr 16. pii: S1701-2163(19)30082-9. [Epub ahead of print]

The Quality of Information on Combined Oral Contraceptives Available on the Internet.

Andreana Marcinkow, Polina Parkhomchik, Alyssa Schmode, Nese Yuksel.

  OBJECTIVE: Combined oral contraceptives (COC) are a popular choice among women. The Internet is an accessible and popular source of information on contraception. The objective of this study was to evaluate the quality of online information on COC.METHODS: A quantitative content analysis was completed on websites containing patient health information on COCs. The search was completed in October 2016 using Google; search terms included "birth control pill," "oral contraception," "oral birth control", "birth control," and "pregnancy prevention." First three pages of search results were screened according to inclusion criteria. The DISCERN instrument and JAMA Benchmarks were used to assess quality. Websites were analyzed independently by two coders; discrepancies were resolved by third coder (Canadian Task Force Classification III).
RESULTS: Of the 155 websites identified, 32 were eligible for review. Most websites mentioned contraceptive benefit (81.3%), and half reported the typical effectiveness of COCs (53.1%). Commonly included non-contraceptive benefits were alleviation of dysmenorrhea (87.5%) and reduced blood loss (84.4%). Risk of venous thromboembolism was listed in 81.3% of websites, including stroke (56.3%) and myocardial infarction (46.9%); however, sites failed to include details with these risks. Only 46.9% provided information on starting COC; the first-day start method was the most common (40.6%). Nearly half lacked details on managing missed pills (46.9%). The mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level was 9 (SD ± 2.0). The mean DISCERN score was 46.3 (± 9.37), indicating "fair" quality.
CONCLUSION: Online information on COCs was variable in quality, often missing key information for making informed decisions. Health care providers should be aware of information gaps when advising women to seek information online.

Keywords:  Contraception; Internet; combined oral contraceptives; online health information; quality

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jogc.2019.01.024
Int J Obstet Anesth. 2019 Jan 08. pii: S0959-289X(18)30276-0. [Epub ahead of print]

Readability, content, quality and accuracy assessment of internet-based patient education materials relating to labor analgesia.

J Murphy, J Vaughn, K Gelber, A Geller, M Zakowski.

  BACKGROUND: With over 90% of parturients searching the internet for health information, the quality of information is important. Web-based patient education materials (PEMs) related to labor analgesia are frequently of low readability. This study compares the readability, content, quality and accuracy of labor analgesia-related PEMs from relevant healthcare society websites and the top internet search results.METHODS: The first ten PEMs from Google searches for "labor epidural" and "labor pain relief" were compared with PEMs from North American and United Kingdom anesthesiology, obstetric and medical society websites. Readability was assessed utilizing five validated readability indices. Quality was assessed using Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool for Print (PEMAT). The PEMs were graded for accuracy by four obstetric anesthesiologists. Readability, quality and accuracy scores were compared using the independent t-test and content using Chi-square analysis.
RESULTS: Society PEMs were significantly more readable than non-society PEMs for three of five readability indices, though the mean of both groups was at or above an eighth-grade (average age 13-14 years old) reading level. The PEMAT understandability and accuracy scores were significantly higher for society websites. The most frequently mentioned topics were benefits, effects of epidural analgesia on labor and delivery, definitions, post-dural puncture headache and alternative analgesics.
CONCLUSIONS: Google search results for labor analgesia lead to PEMs of variable quality and readability. For readers to be better informed, web-based PEMs should be improved or women directed to society PEMs. Inaccurate information may lead to incorrect expectations and conflict during labor, with potentially lower maternal satisfaction.

Keywords:  Epidural; Internet; Labor analgesia; Patient education materials; Pregnancy

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijoa.2019.01.003
Curr Med Res Opin. 2019 Apr 15. 1

Ghostwriting in biomedicine: a review of the published literature.

Lisa M DeTora, Michelle A Carey, Dikran Toroser, Ellen Z Baum.

  INTRODUCTION: The systematic review of biomedical ghostwriting has proven challenging due to problems in consistency and in study design. Moreover, authorship guidelines established by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) may have inadvertently created opportunities to potentiate ghostwriting. Given continued interest in ghostwriting by the International Society of Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP) and other organizations, we undertook an analysis of ghostwriting in the biomedical literature.METHODS: We searched PubMed (search terms: ghost writ*, ghostwrit*, ghost writer, ghostwriter, ghostwriting, and ghost writing). Results, including abstracts, were reviewed for relevance (relationship to ghostwriting in biomedical journals) to aid in removal of inapplicable work and duplicate publications. After review, we consolidated expert opinions for publication professionals.
RESULTS: Overlap was poor across search terms; of 181 unique papers identified; most (112/181) were opinion pieces. An increasing number of papers are using the term "ghostwriting" to describe genetics as well as diverse phenomena of misattributed authorship, including "ghost authorship." Eight primary studies and 1 systematic review of ghostwriting incidence were identified, reporting prevalence ranging from <1% to 91%, in varied settings using differing methods and definitions of ghostwriting. Suggestions for avoiding ghostwriting include early consensus building and better definitions of authorship among manuscript teams.
DISCUSSION: The prevalence and definition of ghostwriting remain unclear. Increased transparency and auditable authorship practices that align with specific guidelines may aid in the avoidance of ghostwriting. In addition, MeSH or clearer indexing terms may be helpful to separate usages of ghostwriting in scientific settings (e.g., genetic research) versus biomedical publishing.

Keywords:  authorship; ghost writing; ghostwriting; publication ethics; transparency

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1080/03007995.2019.1608101
PLoS One. 2019 ;14(4): e0215147

Interactive biomedical ontology matching.

Xingsi Xue, Zhi Hang, Zhengyi Tang.

Due to continuous evolution of biomedical data, biomedical ontologies are becoming larger and more complex, which leads to the existence of many overlapping information. To support semantic inter-operability between ontology-based biomedical systems, it is necessary to identify the correspondences between these information, which is commonly known as biomedical ontology matching. However, it is a challenge to match biomedical ontologies, which dues to: (1) biomedical ontologies often possess tens of thousands of entities, (2) biomedical terminologies are complex and ambiguous. To efficiently match biomedical ontologies, in this paper, an interactive biomedical ontology matching approach is proposed, which utilizes the Evolutionary Algorithm (EA) to implement the automatic matching process, and gets a user involved in the evolving process to improve the matching efficiency. In particular, we propose an Evolutionary Tabu Search (ETS) algorithm, which can improve EA's performance by introducing the tabu search algorithm as a local search strategy into the evolving process. On this basis, we further make the ETS-based ontology matching technique cooperate with the user in a reasonable amount of time to efficiently create high quality alignments, and make use of EA's survival of the fittest to eliminate the wrong correspondences brought by erroneous user validations. The experiment is conducted on the Anatomy track and Large Biomedic track that are provided by the Ontology Alignment Evaluation Initiative (OAEI), and the experimental results show that our approach is able to efficiently exploit the user intervention to improve its non-interactive version, and the performance of our approach outperforms the state-of-the-art semi-automatic ontology matching systems.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0215147
Proc Int AAAI Conf Weblogs Soc Media. 2018 Jun;2018 660-663

"Is this a STD? Please help!": Online Information Seeking for Sexually Transmitted Diseases on Reddit.

Alicia L Nobles, Caitlin N Dreisbach, Jessica Keim-Malpass, Laura E Barnes.

Increasing incidence of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) has prompted the public health and technology communities to innovate new measures to understand how individuals use Internet resources to attain relevant information, particularly for sensitive or stigmatized conditions. The purpose of this study is to examine recent health information seeking and needs of the r/STD community, a subreddit focused exclusively on STDs. We found that the majority of posts crowd-source information about intermediate, non-reportable STDs such as human papillomavirus (HPV). Crowdsourced information in this community focused on symptoms, treatment, as well as the social and emotional aspects of sexual health such as fear of misdiagnosis. From our analysis, it is clear that online communities focused on discussion of health symptoms have the ripe potential to influence information-seeking behavior and consumer action.
J Med Internet Res. 2019 Apr 16. 21(4): e10389

Web-Based Health Information Technology: Access Among Latinos Varies by Subgroup Affiliation.

Mariaelena Gonzalez, Ashley Sanders-Jackson, Tashelle Wright.

  BACKGROUND: There are significant health technology gaps between Latinos and non-Hispanic whites and between first- and second-generation Latinos.OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to examine disparities in Web-based health information-seeking behavior (HISB) and patient portal use among Latinos, taking into account nativity and subethnic affiliation.
METHODS: We analyzed US-born, non-Hispanic whites and Latinos adults (N=49,259) and adult internet users (N=36,214) in the 2015 to 2016 National Health Interview Survey using a binary logistic regression controlling for individual difference level variables. Outcomes were internet use, HISB (health information-seeking online and using a chat group for health information), and patient portal use (using a computer to schedule an appointment, filling a prescription, and communicating with a provider).
RESULTS: We found that US-born Mexicans (odds ratio [OR] 0.81, 95% CI 0.66-0.99), foreign-born Mexicans (OR 0.35, 95% CI 0.29-0.42), foreign-born Puerto Ricans (OR 0.62, 95% CI 0.44-0.87), foreign-born Central and South Americans (OR 0.42, 95% CI 0.33-0.53), and foreign-born other Latinos (OR 0.34, 95% CI 0.24-0.49) had lower odds of using the internet than US-born non-Hispanic whites. The relationship between subgroup affiliation and Web-based HISB varied by type of technology. US-born Mexicans (OR 0.77, 95% CI 0.66-0.9), foreign-born Mexicans (OR 0.51, 95% CI 0.43-0.61), foreign-born Central and South Americans (OR 0.53, 95% CI 0.43-0.64), and foreign-born other Latinos (OR 0.56, 95% CI 0.4-0.79) had lower odds of looking up health information online than US-born non-Hispanic whites. Controlling for age, sex, education, income to federal poverty level, and region, foreign-born Central and South Americans (OR 0.61, 95% CI 0.41-0.92) and foreign-born other Latinos (OR 0.26, 95% CI 0.1-0.68) had lower odds of filling a prescription using a computer than US-born non-Hispanic whites. Foreign-born Mexicans (OR 0.51, 95% CI 0.36-0.72) and foreign-born Central and South Americans (OR 0.7, 95% CI 0.5-0.99) have lower odds of emailing a health care provider than US-born non-Hispanic whites. Posthoc analyses were conducted among Mexican-Americans to see if age was significant in predicting Web-based HISB or other patient portal use. We found individuals aged 18 to 30 years had higher odds of using the internet (OR 3.46, 95% CI 2.61-4.59) and lower odds of looking up health information online (OR 0.75, 95% CI 0.58-0.96). A posthoc analysis was conducted among Mexican-Americans to see if nativity predicted Web-based HISB and patient portal use. We found that US-born individuals had higher odds (OR 52.9, 95% CI 1.2-1.93) of looking up health information online compared with foreign-born individuals.
CONCLUSIONS: We found Latino subgroups do not use health information channels equally, and attempts to target Latinos should take ethnicity and nativity into account.

Keywords:  Hispanic Americans; health information technology; information seeking behavior; minority health

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/10389
J Health Commun. 2019 Apr 15. 1-13

The Roles of Education, Literacy, and Numeracy in Need for Health Information during the Second Half of Adulthood: A Moderated Mediation Analysis.

Takashi Yamashita, Anthony R Bardo, Pa Cummins, Roberto J Millar, Shalini Sahoo, Darren Liu.

We examine complex pathways that link health information seeking behavior with education and health literacy (decomposed into general literacy and numeracy), and how these pathways differ by perceived health status (need) among a nationally representative sample of Americans age 50 and older (n = 2,750). Data come from the Program for International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC). Multi-group structural equation models were used to examine the use of eight health information sources (newspapers, magazines, internet, radio, TV, books, friends/family, and health professionals). Findings partially support the long-standing notion that health seeking behaviors are directly linked to educational attainment, and provide some of the first nationally representative evidence for how education functions through distinct health literacy components to shape health information seeking behaviors by health status. Findings from this moderated mediation analysis point to the importance of examining, and addressing, health literacy disparities in access to and use of health information.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2019.1601303
Female Pelvic Med Reconstr Surg. 2019 Apr 12.

Evaluating the Quality and Readability of Online Resources for Labiaplasty.

Lopa K Pandya, Catherine O Hudson, Courtney D Lynch, Silpa Nekkanti, Pamela E Smith, Andrew F Hundley.

OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to evaluate the quality, readability, and accuracy of Web-based information regarding labiaplasty and to characterize the types of Web sites providing this information.METHODS: Investigators used 3 major search engines to query the internet using the search terms labiaplasty, labia reduction, and vaginal rejuvenation. Two validated tools were used to evaluate Web sites: the JAMA benchmark tool and the DISCERN instrument. Three physicians independently reviewed each Web site. Interrater agreement was assessed, and reviewer scores were averaged. Flesch-Kincaid reading ease and Flesch-Kincaid grade level of each site were assessed. Data were analyzed using Stata 14.0 (College Station, TX).
RESULTS: Of the 112 Web sites reviewed, 100 Web sites were from North America, 9 from Europe, 2 from Australia, and 1 from Asia. The median score using the JAMA tool was 1.0 (0.33-4.0), indicating low accountability, whereas the median score using the DISCERN tool was 28 (18.7-77) of 80 with higher scores indicating higher quality. Cohen's weighted κ statistic (0.81) demonstrated near perfect agreement among reviewers for DISCERN scores. The median reading level was 11.9 (6.4-19.5). A majority of the Web sites (92) were for-profit businesses or blogs.
CONCLUSIONS: The internet enables patients to research sensitive topics and seek answers without worry of social stigma. Online health-related information is a widely used yet poorly studied source of medical information. The majority of Web sites reviewed lack balanced, evidence-based information. Given the wide variation in the quality of information, physicians should guide patients to reputable online resources.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1097/SPV.0000000000000725
Tex Med. 2019 Apr 01. 115(4): 39-43

Searching for a Better Online Reputation.

Sean Price.

What people see on the internet can bring in - or drive away - patients. But most physicians are not trained in either communications or digital technology, and so have little understanding of the financial impact of search engines, social media, and review sites.
Patient Educ Couns. 2019 Mar 27. pii: S0738-3991(19)30100-4. [Epub ahead of print]

What we know about media communication on antibiotics and antimicrobial resistance: A systematic review of the scientific literature.

Daniel Catalán-Matamoros, Antoine Pariente, Carlos Elías-Pérez.

  OBJECTIVE: Systematically review the literature regarding media communication about antibiotics and anti-microbial resistance (AMR) to synthesise its key characteristics and impact effectiveness, identifying gaps and areas for further research.METHODS: A comprehensive systematic review covering five international databases for articles published between 1st September 2008 and 1st September 2018 was performed using the registered protocol (PROSPERO: CRD42018116464). The search using terms related to media communication and antibiotics or AMR yielded 19 eligible studies, which were analysed and qualitatively synthesised.
RESULTS: Research on media communication regarding antibiotics or AMR has rapidly increased in the last decade. 74% of studies used a media content analysis method, while the remaining studies collected data via surveys. Print media were examined in 53% (n = 10), with 74% (n = 14) focused on English language media.
CONCLUSION: Currently, knowledge regarding media communication of antibiotics and AMR is very restricted to English-speaking print media. Further research is required to understand communication on this topic from other media (types and geographical regions) as well as how media effects attitude and behaviour change.
PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Better understanding of media communication regarding antibiotics and AMR may be crucial for policymakers and public health experts when planning strategies to tackle this issue.

Keywords:  Anti-bacterial agents; Antibiotics; Antimicrobial stewardship; Communication; Health communication

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2019.03.020
Korean J Fam Med. 2019 Apr 18.

Evaluating the Effect of Educational Interventions on Health Literacy through Social Networking Services to Promote Students' Quality of Life.

Mahnaz Khaleghi, Farkhonde Amin Shokravi, Nooshin Peyman, Maryam Moridi.

  Background: Studies have shown the health literacy effects on the general state of health and its related factors, as well as health outcomes, physical and mental health, and health-related quality of life. This study aimed to investigate the effect of training based on health literacy through social networking strategies to promote health-related quality of life among students of Islamic Azad University, Shahr Rey Branch, Iran.Methods: This randomized controlled trial was conducted on 120 students with poor or average quality of life score. Participants were randomly assigned into experimental and control groups (60 participants each). Health literacy and quality of life data were collected at baseline, immediately after, and 3 months after intervention. The educational intervention was conducted online using social networking services. Data were analyzed using SPSS ver. 16.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA).
Results: The results showed no significant differences between the two groups in terms of health literacy and quality of life at baseline (P=0.979 and 0.269, respectively). The mean score of health literacy and quality of life in the experimental group, compared with the control group, significantly increased immediately after and 3 months after the intervention (P<0.001).
Conclusion: The educational intervention administered by applying health literacy strategies online, through social networking services, can be effective in improving the quality of life of students.

Keywords:  Health Literacy; Quality of Life; Social Networking; Students

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.4082/kjfm.18.0060
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2019 Apr 02. pii: E1183. [Epub ahead of print]16(7):

Status Quo of Professional⁻Patient Relations in the Internet Era: Bibliometric and Co-Word Analyses.

Zekun Wang, Zhaohua Deng, Xiang Wu.

  Background: Incidents of violence against medical staff have increased in intensity, showing the deteriorating relationship between doctors and patients in China over the past few years. In addition, professional-patient relations have been significantly affected in the Internet era in China, which has attracted great attention from many scholars. This study aims to analyze the research status of professional-patient relations in the Internet era in China and further reveal its research pattern and trends. Methods: This study collected journal articles published during the past 21 years from the Wanfang Data Knowledge Service Platform. Then, bibliometric analysis was carried out, including publication growth, core author and collaborative degree, highly cited papers, journal distribution, and institution distribution analyses. We also analyzed the subject heading-source literature matrix and co-occurrence matrix of keywords through hierarchical cluster, social network, and strategic diagram analyses. Results: The number of articles has continually risen since 1998, which follows the growth law of literature. Furthermore, the distribution of these studies obeys Bradford's law of scattering, and mainly concentrates on the fields of medicine and health technology. The distribution of high-frequency keywords follows Zipf's law. Conclusions: We identified eight focal research directions, namely: website building (especially for professional-patient interaction), telemedicine, professional-patient communication and network public opinion, professional-patient contradiction and health education, new media, follow-up interaction platform, healthcare reform and computer network, and medical ethics.

Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Cluster analysis; Internet; Professional–Patient Relations; Social networking

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16071183
Ophthalmology. 2019 Apr 11. pii: S0161-6420(18)32292-9. [Epub ahead of print]

Google searches and detection of conjunctivitis epidemics worldwide.

Michael S Deiner, Stephen D McLeod, Jessica Wong, James Chodosh, Thomas M Lietman, Travis C Porco.

PURPOSE: and Objective: Epidemic and seasonal infectious conjunctivitis outbreaks can adversely impact education, workforce and economy. Yet conjunctivitis is typically not a reportable disease, potentially delaying mitigating intervention. Our study objective was to determine if conjunctivitis epidemics could be identified using Google Trends search data.DESIGN: Search data for conjunctivitis-related and control search terms from 5 years and countries worldwide were obtained. Country and term were masked. Temporal scan statistics were applied to identify candidate epidemics. Candidates were then assessed for geotemporal concordance with an a priori defined collection of known reported conjunctivitis outbreaks, as a measure of sensitivity.
PARTICIPANTS: Populations by country that searched Google's search engine using our study terms.
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Percent of known conjunctivitis outbreaks also found in the same country and time period by our candidate epidemics, identified from conjunctivitis-related searches RESULTS: We identified 135 candidate conjunctivitis epidemic periods from 77 countries. Compared to our a priori defined collection of known reported outbreaks, candidate conjunctivitis epidemics identified 18 out of 26 (69% sensitivity) of the reported country-wide and/or island nation-wide outbreaks, 9 out of 20 (45% sensitivity) of the reported region and/or district-wide outbreaks, but far fewer nosocomial and reported smaller outbreaks. Similar overall and individual sensitivity, as well as specificity, was found on a country-level basis. We also found that 83% of our candidate epidemics had start dates prior (of those, 20% were over 12 weeks prior) to their concurrent reported outbreak's report issuance date. Permutation tests provided evidence that on average conjunctivitis candidate epidemics occurred geotemporally closer to outbreak reports than chance alone would suggest (P <0.001), unlike control term candidates (P=0.40).
CONCLUSIONS: Conjunctivitis outbreaks can be detected using temporal scan analysis of Google search data alone, with over 80% detected prior to an outbreak report's issuance date, some as early as the reported outbreak's start date. Future approaches using data from smaller regions, social media and more search terms may further improve sensitivity and cross-validate detected candidates, allowing identification of candidate conjunctivitis epidemics from Internet search data to potentially complementarily benefit traditional reporting and detection systems to improve epidemic awareness.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ophtha.2019.04.008
Br J Educ Psychol. 2019 Apr 16.

Improving university students' web savvy: An intervention study.

Sarah McGrew, Mark Smith, Joel Breakstone, Teresa Ortega, Sam Wineburg.

  BACKGROUND: Young people increasingly turn to the Internet for information about social and political issues. However, they struggle to evaluate the trustworthiness of the information they encounter online.AIMS: This pilot study investigated whether a focused curricular intervention could improve university students' ability to make sound judgements of credibility.
SAMPLE: Participants (n = 67) were students in four sections of a 'critical thinking and writing' course at a university on the West Coast of the United States. Course sections were randomly assigned to treatment (n = 29) and control conditions (n = 38).
METHODS: We conducted a pre-and-posttest, treatment/control experiment using a 2 × 2 × 2 design (treatment condition × order × time) with repeated measures on the last factor. Students in the treatment group received two 75-min lessons on evaluating the credibility of online content. An assessment of online reasoning was administered to students 6 weeks prior to the intervention and again 5 weeks after.
RESULTS: Students in the treatment group were significantly more likely than students in the control group to have shown gains from pretest to posttest.
CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that teaching students a small number of flexible heuristics that can be applied across digital contexts can improve their evaluation of online sources.

Keywords:  civic education; digital literacy; performance assessment

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/bjep.12279