Shahmeen Irshad|Nasir Asif|Usman Ashraf|Hamzah Ashraf
An Analysis of the Readability of Online Sarcoidosis Resources
Richmond University Medical Center|Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey|Richmond University Medical Center|Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey|Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey|Richmond University Medical Center|Richmond University Medical Center|Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
introduction sarcoidosis inflammatory disease characterized formation noncaseating granulomas multiple organ systems presentation vary widely although patients sarcoidosis asymptomatic sarcoidosis also present others symptomatic multiorgan system involvement considering potential severity disease patients need wellinformed sarcoidosis better manage health study aims assess readability levels online resources sarcoidosis methods conducted retrospective crosssectional study term sarcoidosis searched online using google bing find websites written english website categorized type academic commercial government nonprofit physician readability scores website calculated using six different readability tests fleschkincaid reading ease fkre fleschkincaid grade level fkgl gunning fog score gfs simple measure gobbledygook smog automated readability index ari colemanliau index cli fkre gives score corresponds difficulty text remaining tests give score corresponds grade level terms reading ability onesample ttest used compare test scores national recommended standard sixthgrade reading level null hypothesis readability scores websites searched would differ statistically significantly sixthgrade reading level would significant differences across website categories evaluate difference categories websites anova testing used results thirtyfour websites analyzed six readability tests websites average score corresponded significantly harder read nationally recommended sixthgrade reading level p0001 none mean readability scores showed statistically significant difference across five different website categories conclusions first study knowledge examine readability online english resources sarcoidosis calculate standardized readability scores implies online english material sarcoidosis health literacy recommended reading levels patients need simplify material easier read patients