New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA.
J Altern Complement Med. 2012 May;18(5):487-93. doi: 10.1089/acm.2011.0110. Epub 2012 May 2.
Medical research news provided through the World Wide Web is easily accessible to the general public. Thus, it is necessary to understand how research findings released from online news sources are portrayed.
The sample includes articles (n=205) published between January 1, 2010 and June 18, 2010 in top online news sites with competitive traffic rankings in the United States as determined by Alexa.com. Google Reader was used to find health-related news articles corresponding to the relevant news sources. Data analysis was performed using SPSS with two-tailed significance values of the χ(2) statistic.
A content analysis (n=205 stories) revealed that the majority of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) modalities for cancer discussed in top online news sources are classified as nutritional therapeutics, and the cancer topic that appeared most frequently was that of prevention. General oncology was the most frequently cited cancer type that was discussed with regard to CAM. Medical journals were the most frequently cited source in CAM/cancer news articles. The majority of news stories on CAM/cancer were neutral in tone, and the relationship between tone and evidence type reported was statistically significant. Observational studies rather than randomized controlled trials were the predominant form of evidence provided for research findings.
Overall, the quality of how online news sources report research findings on complementary and alternative medicine therapies for cancer is fairly high. However, certain top online media sources are more reliable and informative than others when it comes to reporting about CAM remedies for cancer.
互联网上提供的医学研究新闻很容易被公众获取。因此，有必要了解在线新闻来源发布的研究结果是如何描述的。
本研究的样本包括 2010 年 1 月 1 日至 2010 年 6 月 18 日期间在美国 Alexa.com 网站排名前几名的在线新闻网站上发表的文章（n=205）。使用 Google Reader 查找与相关新闻来源相对应的健康相关新闻文章。使用 SPSS 进行数据分析，采用双侧 χ(2)统计量的显著性值。
内容分析（n=205 篇报道）显示，在顶级在线新闻来源中讨论的癌症的大多数补充和替代医学（CAM）疗法被归类为营养疗法，出现频率最高的癌症主题是预防。一般肿瘤学是讨论 CAM 与癌症相关的最常被引用的癌症类型。医学期刊是 CAM/癌症新闻文章中最常被引用的来源。关于 CAM/癌症的大多数新闻报道在语气上都是中立的，语气和报道证据类型之间的关系具有统计学意义。观察性研究而不是随机对照试验是提供研究结果的主要证据形式。
总体而言，在线新闻来源报告补充和替代医学疗法治疗癌症的研究结果的质量相当高。然而，某些顶级在线媒体来源在报道 CAM 治疗癌症方面比其他来源更可靠和有信息量。
