The Importance of Health Website Assessment Criteria Based on the Opinions of Hospital Librarians

Many criteria are involved in the assessment of websites. The importance of these criteria differs depending on their various subject areas. The purpose of this study was to identify the importance of assessment criteria of health websites based on the opinions of hospital librarians. This descriptive study was conducted in 2011. After face and content validity of the researcher constructed questionnaire (based on the likert scale) were evaluated, its reliability was determined by Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (0.98). The questionnaire was distributed between all librarians of 30 hospital libraries affiliated with Tehran University of Medical Sciences and Shahid Beheshti University. 53 questionnaires were collected. Data analysis was done using descriptive statistics (mean, median, mode, and standard deviation) in SPSS for Windows (version 19). Of the information quality criteria, accuracy had of the highest degree of importance (4.56), and price and response time had the lowest degree of importance (2.52). Moreover, in the external indicators group author credentials had the highest mean (4.73), and accessibility and advertising policy had the lowest mean of importance (2.20). Based on librarian’s opinions, the evaluation criteria of websites’ content information quality are of greater importance than their external indicators.