Hansberry D R, Donovan A L, Prabhu A V, Agarwal N, Cox M, Flanders A E
From the Department of Radiology (D.R.H., M.C., A.E.F.), Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Department of Radiation Oncology (A.L.D., A.V.P.), University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
AJNR Am J Neuroradiol. 2017 Jun;38(6):1252-1256. doi: 10.3174/ajnr.A5151. Epub 2017 Apr 6.
More than 75 million Americans have less than adequate health literacy skills according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Readability scores are used as a measure of how well populations read and understand patient education materials. The purpose of this study was to assess the readability of Web sites dedicated to patient education for radiologic spine imaging and interventions.
Eleven search terms relevant to radiologic spine imaging were searched on the public Internet, and the top 10 links for each term were collected and analyzed to determine readability scores by using 10 well-validated quantitative readability assessments from patient-centered education Web sites. The search terms included the following: x-ray spine, CT spine, MR imaging spine, lumbar puncture, kyphoplasty, vertebroplasty, discogram, myelogram, cervical spine, thoracic spine, and lumbar spine.
Collectively, the 110 articles were written at an 11.3 grade level (grade range, 7.1-16.9). None of the articles were written at the American Medical Association and National Institutes of Health recommended 3rd-to-7th grade reading levels. The vertebroplasty articles were written at a statistically significant ( < .05) more advanced level than the articles for x-ray spine, CT spine, and MR imaging spine.
Increasing use of the Internet to obtain health information has made it imperative that on-line patient education be written for easy comprehension by the average American. However, given the discordance between readability scores of the articles and the American Medical Association and National Institutes of Health recommended guidelines, it is likely that many patients do not fully benefit from these resources.
根据美国国家教育统计中心的数据，超过7500万美国人的健康素养技能不足。可读性分数被用作衡量人群阅读和理解患者教育材料能力的指标。本研究的目的是评估专门用于脊柱放射成像和干预患者教育的网站的可读性。
在公共互联网上搜索了11个与脊柱放射成像相关的搜索词，并收集和分析了每个词的前10个链接，以使用来自以患者为中心的教育网站的10种经过充分验证的定量可读性评估方法来确定可读性分数。搜索词包括：脊柱X光、脊柱CT、脊柱磁共振成像、腰椎穿刺、椎体后凸成形术、椎体成形术、椎间盘造影、脊髓造影、颈椎、胸椎和腰椎。
总体而言，这110篇文章的写作水平为11.3年级（年级范围为7.1 - 16.9）。没有一篇文章的写作水平达到美国医学协会和美国国立卫生研究院推荐的3至7年级阅读水平。椎体成形术相关文章的写作水平在统计学上显著高于（<.05）脊柱X光、脊柱CT和脊柱磁共振成像相关文章。
越来越多的人通过互联网获取健康信息，因此在线患者教育必须以普通美国人易于理解的方式编写。然而，鉴于文章的可读性分数与美国医学协会和美国国立卫生研究院推荐的指南不一致，许多患者可能无法从这些资源中充分受益。
