Readability and quality assessment of online information on Lisfranc complex injuries

In this age of digital and social media, online health information is easily accessible. Patients are more likely to be fully aware and averse of their underlying health condition. This makes it paramount to have quality and easily comprehensible information available to general public. The goal of this study is to evaluate the readability and quality of information available on the Internet relating to Lisfranc complex injuries.To identify potential web sites, five most common internet search engines, Google, Bing, Yahoo, Yandex and Duck Duck go were used and a search for "Lisfranc complex injuries" and “Lisfranc fractures” was performed on each. 98 web sites were reviewed. Quality of information was assessed by DISCERN tool, Journal of American Medical Association benchmark criteria, JAMA and Health on the Net code (HON) while readability was analysed with Flesch Reading Ease score (FRES), Flesch Kincaid Grade level (FKG) and Gunning Fog Index (GFI) scores.After removing duplicates, 98 web sites were identified and analysed. Only 17% of the websites were Health on the Net Code Certified. HON-code certified websites demonstrated higher quality information than those without the code. They also achieved significantly greater JAMA scores. 97% of the websites were above the recommended 6 grade readability level. Flesch readability ease score of more than 80 websites (81%) was below 60 which makes them fairly difficult to read by public.Like other orthopaedic problemsonline information on Lisfranc injuries is of dubious quality. Most of the available information is either set at an academic level standard that is too difficult to comprehend by an average layman person or its too deficient. As a result, the need of hour is to have simple, reliable and quality assured online information available to the patient.