Audiology

Aim: With the spread of the internet network, people are doing research on internet sites to get information about their disease before applying to the hospital. However, these resources are not written by the education level of the patients and may have weak content. This study; was aimed to evaluate tinnitus, which is frequently encountered, in terms of the readability of informative materials on internet sites.
Method: In our research, 'ringing' was scanned in Google, the most used search engine in Turkey. The education levels and readability levels of the first 100 websites that met the screening criteria were calculated according to the Çetinkaya-Uzun and Ateşman formulas developed for Turkish. Calculated sites were grouped according to their source and authors.
Results: Of the 100 websites included in the study, 33 personal (doctor's site/blog), 31 hospital, 14 newspaper, 3 association, and 19 company sites. While 61 of the sites provided information from experts, it was determined that 39 of them were not experts in the field. When the academic affiliation was checked, 41 of the 100 sites had an academic affiliation of the author. While the average readability of all sites was difficult according to Ateşman (mean+SD=46.34+10.79; min-max=12.40-70.36), according to Çetinkaya-Uzun it was educational (median±SD=43.46±3.23 min-max= 36.99-60.07). readable and 8-9. detected at grade level.
Conclusion: This study reveals that the content of Turkish web pages that provide information to patients about tinnitus is poor and difficult to read.