In 2003 the site «Antibiotics and antimicrobial therapy» (ANTIBI0TIC.ru) is recognized as conforming to the code of the Health On the Net foundation. Specialists in telemedicine from 11 countries organized the Health On the Net foundation in Geneva in 1995. The specialists of the foundation worked out a code aiming at the unification and standardization of the approaches to the problem of ensuring the reliability of medical information available in the global World Wide Web network and medical sites should conform to that code.
In 2003 the site «Antibiotics and antimicrobial therapy» (ANTIBI0TIC.ru) is recognized as conforming to the code of the Health On the Net foundation.
At present on the Internet there are a lot of sites containing «pseudomedical» information, publishing unchecked data, improper drug advertisements, the so-called «folk medicine advise» and maintaining all kinds of doctors' consultations on-line. The information published on those sites is far from the principles of evidence-based medicine, but there is no censorship on the Net. The creation of a special zone for specialized medical portals could have assured users that they get truly qualitative and highly reliable information. That is why in March 2000 the World Health Organization (WHO) submitted to the main domain registrar - the ICANN company - a request to open the first-level domain .health that was intended for medical sites. But ICANN did not support this proposal.
Nevertheless, there is an organization - the Health On the Net foundation - that guarantees the adherence at least to the basic rules ensuring the reliability of the content of a medical site.
Specialists in telemedicine from 11 countries organized the Health On the Net foundation in Geneva in 1995. The specialists of the foundation worked out a code aiming at the unification and standardization of the approaches to the problem of ensuring the reliability of medical information available in the global World Wide Web network and medical sites should conform to that code. Thus, only people with the appropriate professional training should create them, the information should be supported by the reference to the primary source. Besides, there should be no replacement of the usual contacts between a patient and a doctor. Also, the visitor should have a clear understanding about the sources financing the site.
After the specialists of the foundation certify a site, the HONcode symbol is placed on its main page, which guarantees the quality and reliability of the information.
- The full version of the HON code can be found here.
