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- Title
Portrayal of Complementary and Alternative Medicine for Cancer by Top Online News Sites.
- Authors
Price, Alexandra; Grann, Victor R.
- Abstract
Background: Medical research news provided through the World Wide Web is easily accessible to the general public. Thus, it is necessary to understand how research findings released from online news sources are portrayed. Methods: The sample includes articles ( n=205) published between January 1, 2010 and June 18, 2010 in top online news sites with competitive traffic rankings in the United States as determined by . Google Reader was used to find health-related news articles corresponding to the relevant news sources. Data analysis was performed using SPSS with two-tailed significance values of the χ2 statistic. Results: A content analysis ( n=205 stories) revealed that the majority of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) modalities for cancer discussed in top online news sources are classified as nutritional therapeutics, and the cancer topic that appeared most frequently was that of prevention. General oncology was the most frequently cited cancer type that was discussed with regard to CAM. Medical journals were the most frequently cited source in CAM/cancer news articles. The majority of news stories on CAM/cancer were neutral in tone, and the relationship between tone and evidence type reported was statistically significant. Observational studies rather than randomized controlled trials were the predominant form of evidence provided for research findings. Conclusions: Overall, the quality of how online news sources report research findings on complementary and alternative medicine therapies for cancer is fairly high. However, certain top online media sources are more reliable and informative than others when it comes to reporting about CAM remedies for cancer.
- Subjects
NEW York (State); UNITED States; TUMOR treatment; PRESS criticism; ALTERNATIVE medicine; CHI-squared test; CONTENT analysis; MEDICINE information services; NUTRITION; PREVENTIVE health services; STATISTICAL hypothesis testing; WORLD Wide Web; RESEARCH in alternative medicine; CONSUMER information services; DATA analysis software; DESCRIPTIVE statistics
- Publication
Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine, 2012, Vol 18, Issue 5, p487
- ISSN
1075-5535
- Publication type
Journal Article
- DOI
10.1089/acm.2011.0110