Zhang Dafang, Earp Brandon E, Kilgallen Elliott E, Blazar Philip
Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Brigham and Women's Hospital; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA.
Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Brigham and Women's Hospital; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA.
J Hand Surg Am. 2022 Feb;47(2):186.e1-186.e8. doi: 10.1016/j.jhsa.2021.03.025. Epub 2021 May 20.
Online patient educational materials have historically been written at a higher-than-recommended sixth grade reading level. The objectives of this study were to assess the readability of online hand surgery patient educational materials from the official online patient resource website of the American Society for Surgery of the Hand (ASSH) and to compare changes in the readability of the current ASSH online patient educational materials with those in 2008 and 2015.
An internet-based study of all 88 English language patient educational materials on HandCare.org, the official online patient resource website of the ASSH, was performed. The readability of each article was assessed using the Flesch reading ease formula, Flesch-Kincaid grade level, Coleman-Liau index, Gunning-Fog index, and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook grade level. To evaluate the trend in the readability of ASSH online hand surgery patient educational materials, the Flesch-Kincaid grade levels of articles published in 2020 were compared with those of data published in 2008 and 2015.
The average Flesch reading ease score of the patient educational materials was 57.6, which is at the high-school reading level. The average reading grade level of patient educational materials ranged from 9.0 to 12.3 depending on the readability metric used. The average Flesch-Kincaid grade level of all the ASSH patient educational materials was 9.8 in 2020, which is significantly better than 10.4 in 2008 but significantly worse than 8.5 in 2015.
Online hand surgery patient educational materials continue to be written for the general public at a higher-than-recommended reading grade level. There has been no substantial improvement in the readability of online hand surgery patient educational materials since 2008.
Improvements are needed in the readability of online patient educational materials to ensure that patients with all health literacy levels are able to comprehend and benefit from health information.
在线患者教育材料历来都是以高于推荐的六年级阅读水平编写的。本研究的目的是评估美国手外科协会（ASSH）官方在线患者资源网站上的在线手外科患者教育材料的可读性，并比较当前ASSH在线患者教育材料与2008年和2015年材料可读性的变化。
对ASSH官方在线患者资源网站HandCare.org上的所有88份英语患者教育材料进行了基于互联网的研究。使用弗莱什易读性公式、弗莱什-金凯德年级水平、科尔曼-廖指数、冈宁-福格指数和晦涩难懂度简易测量年级水平来评估每篇文章的可读性。为了评估ASSH在线手外科患者教育材料可读性的趋势，将2020年发表文章的弗莱什-金凯德年级水平与2008年和2015年发表的数据进行了比较。
患者教育材料的平均弗莱什易读性得分是57.6，处于高中阅读水平。根据所使用的可读性指标，患者教育材料的平均阅读年级水平在9.0至12.3之间。2020年所有ASSH患者教育材料的平均弗莱什-金凯德年级水平为9.8，显著优于2008年的10.4，但显著差于2015年的8.5。
在线手外科患者教育材料继续以高于推荐的阅读年级水平面向普通大众编写。自2008年以来，在线手外科患者教育材料的可读性没有实质性提高。
需要提高在线患者教育材料的可读性，以确保所有健康素养水平的患者都能够理解并从健康信息中受益。
