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Family Practice Web Sites: New Perspectives for Patient Care and Health Information?. Family Medicine,2010 Tobias Freund, MD; Michaela Freund, RN; Cornelia Mahler, RN, MA; Ulrich Schwantes, MD; Dominik Ose, MPH; Stefanie Joos, MD; Joachim Szecsenyi, MD, MSc. Background and Objectives.
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Family Practice Web Sites: New Perspectives for Patient Care and Health Information? Family Medicine,2010 Tobias Freund, MD; Michaela Freund, RN; Cornelia Mahler, RN, MA; Ulrich Schwantes, MD; Dominik Ose, MPH; Stefanie Joos, MD; Joachim Szecsenyi, MD, MSc
Background and Objectives • To cater to the needs of informed and proactive patients in family medicine, health care providers could offer access to care and health information via practice Web sites. • To determine the content and quality of family medicine Web sites, we performed a cross-sectional study on a large sample of family practices’ web sites in Berlin, Germany.
Method • Screened all 1,767 registered family physicians in Berlin and using Google look up the Internet presence of every practice. • Using a checklist, we determined the provision of different tasks for the sharing of information with patients.
Health information was referenced on only 30% (n=31) of the Web sites
Discussion • Online tools for appointment scheduling or prescription ordering were rarely provided. • This may be due to the lack of time and financial incentives needed for their implementation.
Information about barrier-free access, however, was not routinely given online. • That should be targeted by quality improvement projects for health information Web sites. • Complementary medicine is frequently provided by family physicians in Germany.
The stating of the date and source of information and some legal issues are major domains where there is a need for further improvement in quality. • Limitationslacking detailed assessment of the accuracy of health information provided on family practice Web sites by comparing the content to existing evidence.
Recommendations • Web sites should provide details about purpose, authors, and date of creation/update. • Barrier-free Web design should be used. • Health information should be referenced accurately. • Consider provision of online appointment scheduling and online prescription ordering.