Internet sources are becoming increasingly important in seeking health information, such that they may have a significant effect on health care decisions and outcomes. Hence, given the wide range of ...different sources of Web-based health information (WHI) from different organizations and individuals, it is important to understand how information seekers evaluate and select the sources that they use, and more specifically, how they assess their credibility and trustworthiness.
The aim of this study was to review empirical studies on trust and credibility in the use of WHI. The article seeks to present a profile of the research conducted on trust and credibility in WHI seeking, to identify the factors that impact judgments of trustworthiness and credibility, and to explore the role of demographic factors affecting trust formation. On this basis, it aimed to identify the gaps in current knowledge and to propose an agenda for future research.
A systematic literature review was conducted. Searches were conducted using a variety of combinations of the terms WHI, trust, credibility, and their variants in four multi-disciplinary and four health-oriented databases. Articles selected were published in English from 2000 onwards; this process generated 3827 unique records. After the application of the exclusion criteria, 73 were analyzed fully.
Interest in this topic has persisted over the last 15 years, with articles being published in medicine, social science, and computer science and originating mostly from the United States and the United Kingdom. Documents in the final dataset fell into 3 categories: (1) those using trust or credibility as a dependent variable, (2) those using trust or credibility as an independent variable, and (3) studies of the demographic factors that influence the role of trust or credibility in WHI seeking. There is a consensus that website design, clear layout, interactive features, and the authority of the owner have a positive effect on trust or credibility, whereas advertising has a negative effect. With regard to content features, authority of the author, ease of use, and content have a positive effect on trust or credibility formation. Demographic factors influencing trust formation are age, gender, and perceived health status.
There is considerable scope for further research. This includes increased clarity of the interaction between the variables associated with health information seeking, increased consistency on the measurement of trust and credibility, a greater focus on specific WHI sources, and enhanced understanding of the impact of demographic variables on trust and credibility judgments.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The scholarly publication landscape continues to grow in complexity, presenting researchers with ever-increasing dilemmas regarding journal choice. However, research into the decision-making ...processes associated with journal choice is limited. This article contributes by reporting on an international survey of researchers in various disciplines and with varying levels of experience. The study examines the extent to which various journal characteristics affect journal selection, perceptions of the extent to which university and national research policies impact on their journal choice, and the influence of academics’ familiarity, confidence and objectives on journal choice. The most important factors influencing journal choice were as follows: reliability of reviewing, usefulness of reviewers’ feedback, the reputation of the journal and confidence that their article is in scope for the journal. Publishing productivity, publishing experience, researcher role and discipline had little impact on the ranking of journal choice factors, suggesting that the research community is homogeneous.
This study investigates the influence of individual and information characteristics on university students' information channel selection (that is, search engines, social question & answer sites, ...online health websites, and social networking sites) of online health information (OHI) for three different types of search tasks (factual, exploratory, and personal experience). Quantitative data were collected via an online questionnaire distributed to students on various postgraduate programs at a large UK university. In total, 291 responses were processed for descriptive statistics, Principal Component Analysis, and Poisson regression. Search engines are the most frequently used among the four channels of information discussed in this study. Credibility, ease of use, style, usefulness, and recommendation are the key factors influencing users' judgments of information characteristics (explaining over 62% of the variance). Poisson regression indicated that individuals' channel experience, age, student status, health status, and triangulation (comparing sources) as well as style, credibility, usefulness, and recommendation are substantive predictors for channel selection of OHI.
This research contributes to the knowledge on academics’ attitudes towards peer review, through an international and inter-disciplinary survey of academics, which profiles academics’ views on the ...value of peer review, its benefits and the prevalence of unethical practices. Generally, academics regarded peer review as beneficial to improving their article and felt that peer review contributed significantly to the effectiveness of scholarly communication. Academics agreed that peer review could improve the readability and quality of the published paper, as well as check for accuracy, appropriate methodology, novelty and relevance to the journal. There are significant differences in the views of respondents on the basis of role, with those involved as reviewers and editors being less positive about peer review than authors. In addition, there is evidence of some disciplinary differences in views on the benefits of peer review.
Academic integrity is at the heart of excellent education. However, resources explaining the concept tend to be definition-driven, while using complex language and sometimes even an austere tone ...designed to discourage students from breaches. This study aims to design and evaluate an online module at a UK University across 2 years, designed to improve students’ understanding of concepts of academic integrity and practice. The module includes a range of interactive resources (e.g., gamified quizzes and e-booklets) and was made available to a large cohort of postgraduate students (448). The study adopts a mixed-methods approach composed of three sequential phases involving first collecting students’ views on existing academic integrity resources (7 students participating in a focus group and 39 competing a questionnaire), then developing a range of new ones based on students’ feedback to form the content of the module, and finally gathering students’ evaluation on the newly created resources (sample size: 361 students). Results illustrate a clear improvement in relation to the accessibility, usefulness and understandability of new resources. Results also highlight a remarkable increase in student confidence levels regarding academic integrity. Students also considered the new module as more appealing and informative. This manuscript offers a good example of a pedagogical approach aimed at promoting academic integrity in an innovative and engaging fashion.
People living with HIV/AIDS and their informal caregivers (usually family members) in Malawi do not have adequate access to patient-centered care, particularly in remote rural areas of the country ...because of the high burden of HIV/AIDS, coupled with a fragmented and patchy health care system. Chronic conditions require self-care strategies, which are now promoted in both developed and developing contexts but are still only emerging in sub-Saharan African countries.
This study aims to explore the effects of the implementation of a short-term intervention aimed at supporting informal caregivers of people living with HIV/AIDS in Malawi in their caring role and improving their well-being. The intervention includes the dissemination of 6 health advisory messages on topics related to the management of HIV/AIDS over a period of 6 months, via the WhatsApp audio function to 94 caregivers attending peer support groups in the rural area of Namwera.
We adopted a community-based participatory research approach, whereby the health advisory messages were designed and formulated in collaboration with informal caregivers, local medical physicians, social care workers, and community chiefs and informed by prior discussions with informal caregivers. Feedback on the quality, relevance, and applicability of the messages was gathered via individual interviews with the caregivers.
The results showed that the messages were widely disseminated beyond the support groups via word of mouth and highlighted a very high level of adoption of the advice contained in the messages by caregivers, who reported immediate (short-term) and long-term self-assessed benefits for themselves, their families, and their local communities.
This study offers a novel perspective on how to combine community-based participatory research with a cost-effective, health-oriented informational intervention that can be implemented to support effective HIV/AIDS self-care and facilitate informal caregivers' role.
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Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Data sharing of Electronic Health Records from general practices to secondary care in Leeds occurs through the so-called Leeds Care Records, which collects a specific set of codes from primary care, ...known as ‘Active Problems’, and presents it to the user. Variability on its content is a known issue. To explore general practitioners’ views on their use of ‘Active Problems’ and on sharing data, so lessons could be learnt on how to homogenise and improve shared data. Assessing Leeds general practitioners’ views through two parallel processes (60 online surveys and 17 interviews). General practitioners feel they do not have the time nor the training required for keeping a shared approach to concise and current Problem Lists in electronic patient records. Action is needed to reduce current variability, and to improve the quality of shared information. Some types of codes currently present in Problem Lists have very little support among general practitioners who consider the focus should be on long-term conditions and probably adding current acute diagnoses and life expectancy items and not omitting sensitive information. There is a perceived need of training and time to update Problem Lists if their quality is to improve.
Uneven vaccination and less resilient health care systems mean hospitals in LMICs are at risk of being overwhelmed during periods of increased COVID-19 infection. Risk-scores proposed for rapid ...triage of need for admission from the emergency department (ED) have been developed in higher-income settings during initial waves of the pandemic.
Routinely collected data for public hospitals in the Western Cape, South Africa from the 27th August 2020 to 11th March 2022 were used to derive a cohort of 446,084 ED patients with suspected COVID-19. The primary outcome was death or ICU admission at 30 days. The cohort was divided into derivation and Omicron variant validation sets. We developed the LMIC-PRIEST score based on the coefficients from multivariable analysis in the derivation cohort and existing triage practices. We externally validated accuracy in the Omicron period and a UK cohort.
We analysed 305,564 derivation, 140,520 Omicron and 12,610 UK validation cases. Over 100 events per predictor parameter were modelled. Multivariable analyses identified eight predictor variables retained across models. We used these findings and clinical judgement to develop a score based on South African Triage Early Warning Scores and also included age, sex, oxygen saturation, inspired oxygen, diabetes and heart disease. The LMIC-PRIEST score achieved C-statistics: 0.82 (95% CI: 0.82 to 0.83) development cohort; 0.79 (95% CI: 0.78 to 0.80) Omicron cohort; and 0.79 (95% CI: 0.79 to 0.80) UK cohort. Differences in prevalence of outcomes led to imperfect calibration in external validation. However, use of the score at thresholds of three or less would allow identification of very low-risk patients (NPV ≥0.99) who could be rapidly discharged using information collected at initial assessment.
The LMIC-PRIEST score shows good discrimination and high sensitivity at lower thresholds and can be used to rapidly identify low-risk patients in LMIC ED settings.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
This article seeks to extend the knowledge of the behaviour and attitudes towards open access publishing through a survey that focusses on the attitudes and behaviours of academic researchers in ...Korea working in medicine and healthcare. Issues covered include: use of and intentions regarding OAP, and perceptions regarding advantages and disadvantages of OAP, journal article publication services, peer review, and re-use. A significant proportion of the articles (mean 58%) published by this group are published gold open access, consistent with the push in Korea towards international impact for their research. Researchers were more positive about the benefits of OAP than they were negative about its disadvantages. Analysis of responses on the basis of gender, and experience in publishing, showed some significant differences in attitudes to some statements.
On April 2, 2018, the State Council of China formally released a national research data management (RDM) policy “Measures for Managing Scientific Dataâ€. Literature review shows that university ...libraries have played an important role in supporting Research Data Management at an institutional level in countries in North America, Europe and Australasia. The aim of this paper is to capture the current status of RDM in Chinese universities, in particular how university libraries have involved in taking the agenda forward.
This paper uses mixed methods: a website analysis of university policies and services; a questionnaire for university librarians; and semi-structured interviews. Findings from website analysis and questionnaires indicate that RDS at a local level in Chinese Universities are in their infancy. On the whole there is more evidence of activity in developing data repositories than support services. Despite the existence of a national policy there remain significant barriers to further service development, such as the lag in the creation of local policy, insufficient funding for technical infrastructure, shortages of staff skills in data curation, and language barriers to international data sharing and open science. RDS in Chinese university libraries are still lagging behind the English-speaking countries and Europe.
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