Hi Quality

Citation

(2003), "Hi Quality", International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, Vol. 16 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijhcqa.2003.06216bag.001

Hi Quality

Hi Qualityhttp://www.hiquality.org.uk/default.htm

As stated in Vol.16 No. 1, "Better information for the UK public", in this issue we are reviewing the Hi Quality Web site provided by the Centre for Health Information Quality (CHIQ). CHIQ has been commissioned by the Department of Health to improve the quality of health information available to the general public. It is a UK development agency, established in 1997 by the NHS Executive. It works with information producers and providers to raise standards in the production of consumer health information.

The Hi Quality Web site was developed by CHIQ with funding from the Department of Health, and aims to raise awareness about quality issues in relation to health information and to raise standards in health information. It was developed with the help of a consumer focus group who provided overall direction for the site. It serves two types of user: those looking for health information and requiring guidance on how to check its quality, and those who produce health information and require guidance on how to assure quality standards. As one would expect of such a site, the creators have tried to make it as accessible as possible. The site has been developed using W3C Web Accessibility Initiative guidelines and RNIB guidelines, and has been improved using the Bobby accessibility engine.

W3C is the World Wide Web Consortium, which is committed to leading the Web to its full potential, including promoting a high degree of usability for people with disabilities. Bobby is a comprehensive Web accessibility software tool designed to help expose and repair barriers to accessibility and encourage compliance with existing accessibility guidelines. Bobby was created at the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST), a not-for-profit research and development organization whose goal is to expand opportunities for people with disabilities through the innovative use of computer technology. CAST has worked closely with the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) to develop an evaluation tool that employs their Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and provides page and site evaluation support for developers.

First released in September 1996, Bobby was originally based on guidelines developed by the Trace Research and Development Center. Bobby is designed for developers to test Web pages and generate summary reports highlighting the most critical issues effecting site accessibility before posting to the Web or to Intranets.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind UK (RNIB) helps anyone with a sight problem, and its guidelines are designed to make information available to blind and partially sighted people.

The Hi Quality Web site provides a set of quality standards pages, which are relevant to producers of health information and two sets of guidelines: the first provides guidelines for reviewing health information and the second provides guidelines for producing health information.

The quality standards deal with informed consent, working with evidence, communicating clearly, involving consumers, and processes and systems

The guidelines for reviewing health information are generic guidelines which have been developed to help with assessing the quality of health information. The guidelines for producing health information have been developed to help people creating health information to achieve high standards of quality. The guidelines consist of fairly comprehensive checklists which allow the material to be checked against key elements concerned with three core principles: accuracy, clarity and relevance. A link is provided to a pdf downloadable version, but this does not appear until the end of the material, and hence can be easily missed. Each of the guidelines also provides a link to a fictitious exemplar Web page about giving up smoking that is designed to highlight good and bad practice in relation to the creation of health information. Many of the issues raised here relate to all types of health information – not just Web-based information.

In addition to the guidelines and quality standards, the site provides a frequently asked questions section that in a sense provides the rationale for much of the material on the Web site by providing answers to questions such as "What is health information appraisal?", "What are the key things to look out for when researching or producing health information?" and "How were the CHIQ guidelines developed?". They also explain what the TriangleMark is. This appears several times throughout the site, and is a new system, developed by the Centre for Health Information Quality, for testing the quality of health information. When the TriangleMark is displayed on a piece of health information, it indicates that the information meets CHIQ standards.

As is usual on sites such as this, there are also links to useful Web sites. The sites are grouped under the following headings:

• •

  Health information quality.

• •

  Researching and testing health information.

• •

  Practical help for creating resources.

• •

  Providers of health information.

• •

  Consumer involvement.

• •

  Evidence-based information.

• •

  Other health organisations.

The final section of the site is a glossary of terms relating to health information.

The site has a limited focus, and hence a limited audience, but it is certainly not restricted to those producing or appraising Web material – indeed, arguably such people are more aware of the issues concerned with the provision of information than those who use more familiar paper-based technologies. The material is relevant to any means of written communication, and a cursory glance at some of the material that has been produced for patients indicates a need for many producers of such material to visit this site!