Laversin Sabine, Baujard Vincent, Gaudinat Arnaud, Simonet Maria-Ana, Boyer Célia
Haute Autorité de Santé, France.
Stud Health Technol Inform. 2011;169:654-8.
This study aims to show that health websites not asking for HONcode certification (Control sample websites A) do not respect elementary ethical standards such as the HONcode. The HONcode quality and ethical standards and the certification process have been developed by the Health on the Net Foundation to improve the transparency of the health and medical information found on the Internet. We compared the compliance with the 8 HONcode principles, and respectively the respect of principles 1 (authority), 4 (assignment), 5 (justification) and 8 (honesty in advertising and editorial policy) by certified websites (A) and by health websites which have not requested the certification (B). The assessment of the HONcode compliance was performed by HON evaluators by the same standards for all type of sites. Results shows that 0.6% of health websites not asking for HONcode certification does respect the eight HONcode ethical standards vs. 89% of certified websites. Regarding the principles 1, 4, 5 and 8, 1.2% of B respect these principles vs. 92% for A. The certification process led health websites to respect the ethical and quality standards such as the HONcode, and disclosing the production process of the health website.
本研究旨在表明，未申请HONcode认证的健康网站（对照样本网站A）不遵守诸如HONcode等基本道德标准。HONcode质量与道德标准以及认证流程由健康在线基金会制定，以提高互联网上健康与医学信息的透明度。我们比较了认证网站（A）和未申请认证的健康网站（B）对8项HONcode原则的遵守情况，以及对原则1（权威性）、4（任务分配）、5（正当理由）和8（广告与编辑政策中的诚实性）的遵守情况。HON评估人员按照相同标准对所有类型的网站进行HONcode合规性评估。结果显示，未申请HONcode认证的健康网站中，0.6%确实遵守八项HONcode道德标准，而认证网站的这一比例为89%。关于原则1、4、5和8，B类网站中有1.2%遵守这些原则，而A类网站为92%。认证流程促使健康网站遵守诸如HONcode等道德和质量标准，并披露健康网站的制作过程。
