A Clinical Tool (CUE-tool) for Health Care Professionals to Assess the Usability and Quality of the Content of Medical Information Websites: Electronic Delphi Study

BACKGROUND: As patients are increasingly searching for information about their medical condition on the internet, there is a need for health professionals to be able to guide patients toward reliable and suitable information sources on the internet. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to develop a clinical tool for health care professionals to assess the usability and quality of the content of websites containing medical information that could be recommended to patients. METHODS: A 3-round modified electronic Delphi (eDelphi) study was conducted with 20 health care professionals. RESULTS: In round one of the eDelphi study, of the 68 items initially created, 41 items (29 on usability and 12 on content) were rated as important or very important by more than half of the panel and thus selected for further evaluation in round two. In round two, of the 41 items chosen from round 1, 19 were selected (9 on usability and 10 on content) as important or very important by more than half of the panel for further evaluation. As a result of round three, 2 items were combined as a single item, leaving the instrument with 18 items in total (8 on usability and 10 on content). The tool is freely accessible online. CONCLUSIONS: The CUE-tool can be used to (1) evaluate the usability and reliability of the content of websites before recommending them to patients as a good information source; (2) identify websites that do not have reliable content or may be difficult for patients to use; (3) develop quality websites by using the criteria in the CUE-tool; and (4) identify different qualities between different websites.