title: Development and validation of a tool to evaluate the quality of medical education websites in pathology.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The exponential use of the internet as a learning resource coupled with varied quality of many websites, lead to a need to identify suitable websites for teaching purposes.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  The aim of this study is to develop and to validate a tool, which evaluates the quality of undergraduate medical educational websites; and apply it to the field of pathology.
  
  
  METHODS
  A tool was devised through several steps of item generation, reduction, weightage, pilot testing, post-pilot modification of the tool and validating the tool. Tool validation included measurement of inter-observer reliability; and generation of criterion related, construct related and content related validity. The validated tool was subsequently tested by applying it to a population of pathology websites.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Reliability testing showed a high internal consistency reliability (Cronbach's alpha = 0.92), high inter-observer reliability (Pearson's correlation r = 0.88), intraclass correlation coefficient = 0.85 and κ =0.75. It showed high criterion related, construct related and content related validity. The tool showed moderately high concordance with the gold standard (κ =0.61); 92.2% sensitivity, 67.8% specificity, 75.6% positive predictive value and 88.9% negative predictive value. The validated tool was applied to 278 websites; 29.9% were rated as recommended, 41.0% as recommended with caution and 29.1% as not recommended.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  A systematic tool was devised to evaluate the quality of websites for medical educational purposes. The tool was shown to yield reliable and valid inferences through its application to pathology websites.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Salmaniya Medical Complex, Ministry of Health, Arabian Gulf University, Bahrain.
authors.forename: Raja H
authors.initials: RH
authors.lastname: Alyusuf
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosciences Centre and Clinical Epidemiology Unit, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Kameshwar
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Prasad
authors.affiliation: College of Medicine and Medical Sciences, Arabian Gulf University, Bahrain.
authors.forename: Ali M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Abdel Satir
authors.affiliation: College of Medicine and Medical Sciences, Arabian Gulf University, Bahrain.
authors.forename: Ali A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Abalkhail
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Salmaniya Medical Complex, Ministry of Health, Arabian Gulf University, Bahrain.
authors.forename: Roopa K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Arora
keywords: Computer assisted learning; e-learning; medical education; pathology; website evaluation