Mothy David, Reddy Aneesh P, Cai Charlene W, Choudhry Hassaam S, Dastjerdi Mohammad H
Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science, Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, Newark, NJ, USA.
Sidney Kimmel Medical College, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
Ophthalmic Epidemiol. 2025 May 4:1-7. doi: 10.1080/09286586.2025.2500014.
To assess the usability of patient education websites for refractive surgery through an analysis of readability, accountability, subjective quality, and visual accessibility.
50 patient education websites for five refractive surgery modalities were gathered from an incognito Google search and categorized by authorship category: institutional, medical organization, or private practice. Each website was assessed for readability, accountability using the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) benchmark, subjective quality using the DISCERN instrument, and visual accessibility was assessed using the Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool (WAVE).
The mean reading grade across all websites was 11.02, exceeding the American Medical Association's recommended 6th-grade level ( < .001). Institutional websites were the most readable (10.32, = 0.005) while private practice sites were the least (11.74, = 0.015). The average JAMA score was 1.52 with no website meeting all four accountability criteria. Websites from medical organizations had significantly higher JAMA scores (1.94, = 0.049). The average DISCERN score was 51.97 with no differences between authorship categories. Websites had an average of 87.84 visual accessibility violations.
Available patient education websites for refractive surgery may suffer from poor readability, quality, and visual accessibility which may limit their usability.
通过分析可读性、问责性、主观质量和视觉可及性，评估屈光手术患者教育网站的可用性。
通过匿名谷歌搜索收集了5种屈光手术方式的50个患者教育网站，并按作者类别进行分类：机构、医学组织或私人诊所。每个网站都进行了可读性评估，使用美国医学会杂志（JAMA）基准进行问责性评估，使用DISCERN工具进行主观质量评估，并使用网络可及性评估工具（WAVE）进行视觉可及性评估。
所有网站的平均阅读等级为11.02，超过了美国医学会推荐的6年级水平（P<0.001）。机构网站的可读性最高（10.32，P=0.005），而私人诊所网站的可读性最低（11.74，P=0.015）。JAMA平均得分为1.52，没有网站符合所有四项问责标准。医学组织的网站JAMA得分显著更高（1.94，P=0.049）。DISCERN平均得分为51.97，作者类别之间没有差异。网站平均存在87.84处视觉可及性违规。
现有的屈光手术患者教育网站可能存在可读性差、质量低和视觉可及性差的问题，这可能会限制其可用性。
