[Dentistry in Wikipedia: A quantitative and qualitative analysis].
The aim of this study was to assess the scientific quality of the 265 dental articles that were present in January 2008 in the German-language version of Wikipedia. For this purpose, the Wikipedia entries were examined for their correctness by comparing them with the current dental literature. Every article was classified as having "textbook quality", "partial textbook quality" or "missing textbook quality". Of the 261 usable articles, 28% were qualitatively comparable to a textbook, while 56% had partial textbook quality. About 16% of the articles fell into the third group. Almost half of the Wikipedia entries fulfilled the qualitative standards, whereas the remaining articles were characterized by omissions. Hence, individuals interested in dental topics should not exclusively rely on Wikipedia. For a cursory overview, however, a search in Wikipedia appears to be in order.
Abteilung Poliklinik für Zahnärztliche Prothetik, Zahn-, Mund- und Kieferklinik, Universitätsklinikum Freiburg i. Br., Deutschland.
Annette
A
Lorenz
Jens C
JC
Türp
D001319:Authorship; D003813:Dentistry; D004690:Encyclopedias as Topic; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D036301:Qualitative Research; D011786:Quality Control; D013782:Textbooks as Topic