About 5% of breast cancer Web sites include inaccurate information, according to a new study in the journal Cancer, Reuters reports.
Researchers at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center examined 343 Web pages and found that one in 20 had inaccuracies. Web sites focused on complementary and alternative medicine were 15 times more likely to contain false or misleading information, according to the researchers.
"The question that we really tried to answer was if we could separate Web sites that have misinformation from sites that have more accurate content," Elmer Bernstam, a researcher at the University of Texas, said, adding, "No combination of the criteria allowed us to differentiate the Web sites with accurate information versus those that did not."
The researchers urged patients to be skeptical of the information they find online and not to take action without talking to a physician (Reuters, 2/11).