A Comparative Study on Efficiency of Medical Specialized Search Engines in Retrieving Information Related to Gynecology and Obstetrics

• Main Authors: Elham Babaei, Mohammad Sajedi
• Format: Article
• Language: fas
• Published: Vesnu Publications 2013-06-01
• Series: مدیریت اطلاعات سلامت
• Online Access: http://him.mui.ac.ir/index.php/him/article/view/1359

Introduction: People are eager to obtain medical information. Existing web search engines cannot handle medical search well because they do not consider its special requirements. One way to restore data in the fields related to medicine is using the search engines that are designed specifically for medical information. This study was performed to compare the level of efficiency of specialized and technical search engines in retrieving documents concerning the obstetrics and gynecological diseases. Methods: To do so, a comparative method was used. Thus, some consultations were made with the obstetricians and the gynecologists, and five keywords related to women's diseases were chosen and searched at five engines i.e. Honsearch (Medhunt), Omni, Pogo Frog, Search Medica, and Trip Database. The required data for this research were collected via a checklist. The first 10 retrieval results of each restoring engine were investigated via the checklist including 47 constituents. The checklist was examined by five experts and professors of Library and Information Sciences. Those questions, which needed to be reviewed for correction, were revised. Thereby, the validity of checklist was confirmed. In this study, the significance level was considered 0.05 (P < 0.05) or the coefficient of trust was equal to 95%. Results: Among 250 retrieved documents Search Medica with 94% of items retrieved was in the top and Pogo Frog with 78% of items retrieved stood in the second place. In addition, given the precision, Search Medica with 94% placed in top and Pogo Frog with 92% was in the second place. In terms of retrieving, no significant difference was observed among the medical search engines. In connection with the authority level of the retrieved resources, the highest authority went to Pogo Frog with 66% and Search Medica with 44% was placed in the second level. Regarding search possibilities and potentials, Med Hunt with score 25 gained the highest rank. Conclusion: Totally, more than half of the retrieved results (75%) in the field of medical search engines were relevant. In order to obtain more specific results, users are advised to search information about gynecological diseases in Search Medica engine which provides enormous potential benefits in retrieving more accurate and relevant documents where broad coverage across a variety of subject areas are encompassed. Keywords: Search Engine; Information Storage and Retrieval; Gynecologic Diseases; Internet