Assessment of Web-Based Consumer Reviews as a Resource for Drug Performance.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Some health websites provide a public forum for consumers to post ratings and reviews on drugs. Drug reviews are easily accessible and comprehensible, unlike clinical trials and published literature. Because the public increasingly uses the Internet as a source of medical information, it is important to know whether such information is reliable.

Objective

We aim to examine whether Web-based consumer drug ratings and reviews can be used as a resource to compare drug performance.

Methods

We analyzed 103,411 consumer-generated reviews on 615 drugs used to treat 249 disease conditions from the health website WebMD. Statistical analysis identified 427 drug pairs from 24 conditions for which two drugs treating the same condition had significantly and substantiall

SUBMITTER: Adusumalli S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4642403 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature