Introduction
During your treatment journey you will have been given information from your healthcare professionals.  The purpose of this page is to help you find quality and trustworthy sources of health information on the internet. You can then choose to add to the information you have already been given and research health related issues for yourself.

The internet is a wonderful resource but not everything found on it is accurate, reliable or up to date.  Anyone can put information on it but there  is no editor checking for inaccuracies or out of date information.  It is up to the user to decide how relevant the information is and to determine the reliability of what they find.

So how can you decide what or who to trust?

Quality Standards
There are two quality standards found on health websites which are a clear indication that the information they contain should be trustworthy.  Many good sites do not have these but these standards are one way for you to judge the reliability of a website.

The Information Standard

The Information Standard is a quality standard that supports the  production of high quality information by organisations having a robust information production process based on best practice to ensure that information it produces meets the needs of its user.
The Information Standard is made up of 6 principles  – each supported by quality statements informed by best practice.  These are designed to show that the organisation has a process in place to produce and sustain good quality, evidence based, health and care information.

Health on the Net Foundation

HON is a not-for-profit international foundation and
non-governmental organisation.  It is the oldest and most valued
quality marker for online health information.  Websites have to
demonstrate 8 principles that they adhere to, to achieve certification.

Please note that the “Health On the Net” logo may appear on sites that are not certified.  To check certification, click on the HON logo.  You should be
directed to a page that includes information stating if the certification is
up to date.

How do I know which information to trust?
When you are looking at a website, remember www.

Who:  Who is the author or publisher of the site and what are their credentials? What are their reasons for publishing, for example, are they trying to give you information or sell you something? Do other websites link to them?  Look at the “About Us” section on the website. This should give you some of this information or tell you more about the organisation or author.

What:  What is on the site? Does the information seem accurate?  Is it relevant and up to date? Do they link the information to evidence?  Do they tell you where the information has come from?  Look at the last updated information (usually at the bottom of the website).  This will tell you when the information was added.  Also check if the links to other information/websites work, are they broken?  This may indicate that the website is not being updated or maintained.

Where:  What part of the world is the website coming from?  Statistics and treatment information may not be relevant to the United Kingdom.  Look at the web address information (in the address bar at the top of the page) as this will often indicate the country of origin and type of organisation.

For example:
.ac = an educational institution               .uk = United Kingdom
.gov.uk = UK government                         .nhs = National Health Service
.org = organisations

Recommended websites
NHS Website:  www.nhs.uk
Find information on diseases and treatments, health and wellbeing information, social care and support, health news analysis.  You can also locate local services including hospitals, GPs and dentists.

NICE Evidence Search:  www.evidence.nhs.uk
Evidence search provides access to selected evidence in health, social care and public health.  Sources that it uses includes healthcare charities and professional bodies including the Department of Health.

Search for a disease and then choose ‘Patient Information’ from the options on the left hand side.

Patient:  www.patient.info
Patient is the UK’s leading independent health site, established for over 15 years.   The site contains over 4000 health information leaflets, a wellbeing centre, a free health check and thousands of discussion forums.