Information quality standards
In its research report 
Assessing the quality of information to support people in making decisions about their health and healthcare Picker Institute Europe encouraged the Department of Health to establish an accreditation scheme for providers of health and social care information.
Consultancy support for testing an Information Accreditation Scheme
Picker Institute Europe worked with Vega, consultants to NHS Direct, to road-test an information accreditation scheme with 40 information providers who volunteered for the pilot phase. The scheme aims to establish a 'kite mark' quality assurance system, in which the accreditation standards apply to information development and publication processes, not to individual products.
Visit the Department's webpage for more information about the accreditation scheme and the pilots.
Information quality standards on the internet:
Picker Institute Europe adapted the IPDAS (International Patient Decision Aids Collaboration) checklist for its 'assessing the quality' research.
The IPDAS Collaboration aims to establish an internationally approved set of criteria to determine the quality of patient decision aids. These criteria will be helpful to a wide variety of individuals and organisations that use and/or develop patient decision aids, including:
- patients or other individuals who are making a health decision
- practitioners guiding patients in making health decisions
- developers of patient decision aids
- researchers or evaluators of patient decision aids
- policy makers or payers of patient decision aids.
The Health on the Net Foundation Code of Conduct
This code of conduct was developed in response to concerns about the varying quality of medical and health information available via the internet. The Code sets out standards for responsible self-regulation including, for example, ensuring that readers always know the source and the purpose of the information he or she is reading.
DISCERN
There is a great deal of written consumer health information on treatment choices available from a variety of sources, including the internet. Not all of this information is good quality and only a small proportion is based on good evidence. Many of the publications available provide inaccurate or confusing advice, and it may be hard to know which information to use and which to discard. DISCERN is an instrument designed to help users of consumer health information judge the quality of written information about treatment choices.