Google Health Search Trial

Diagnoses Disease Clinical Trial

— GHST  

Official title:

Accuracy of Differential Diagnosis From Google Health Search and Impact on Clinical Encounters

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT03073746
• Other study ID #: IRB00088552
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: September 7, 2016
• Est. completion date: August 15, 2017

Study information

• Verified date: April 2019
• Source: Johns Hopkins University
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

There are large differences in knowledge between patients and healthcare providers (i.e. physicians, physician assistants and nurse practitioners), and there is a strong interest on the part of both industry and academia to reduce the gap in knowledge between patients and healthcare providers. Currently, about 1 in 20 searches on Google are health related. Among internet users, 72% reported searching for health information, and among persons who use mobile phones, 31% of cell phone users and 52% of smartphone users have looked up health or medical information. Oftentimes, patients will search on Google or other search engines in order to find health conditions that explain their symptoms prior to visiting their healthcare provider. With the launch of Google's new health search tools for mobile devices (i.e. smartphones, tablets, etc.) it is important to understand how patients use these search platforms and what their effects are on clinical encounters. The main objective of this study is to understand the accuracy of differential diagnoses generated by Google searching; the investigators hypothesize that searching on Google using a tablet or mobile device will be more accurate than not using any search tool, and that the new health search experience will improve accuracy over the standard search platform.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 300
• Est. completion date: August 15, 2017
• Est. primary completion date: August 9, 2017
• Accepts healthy volunteers: No
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Adult patient >= 18 years of age

• Presenting for care at urgent care or emergency department

• In search of a diagnosis to explain a new symptom or group of symptoms

Exclusion Criteria:

• Not literate, defined as lacking the ability to read and write (self-reported)

• Non-English Speaking (self-reported)

• Not mentally competent to provide consent due to inability to understand relevant information due to deficit in intelligence (e.g. mental retardation), memory (e.g., advanced dementia or significant delirium), or attention span (e.g., Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) or mania) based on prior documentation in medical records or as judged by the researchers)

• Unable to use phone/tablet for any mental or physical impairment (e.g., blind) (self-reported)

• Exacerbation of chronic condition (self-reported)

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Diagnoses Disease

Intervention

Other:
• Health Search

• Standard Search

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
United States	Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center	Baltimore	Maryland
United States	Johns Hopkins Hospital	Baltimore	Maryland

Sponsors (2)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
Johns Hopkins University	Google Inc.

Country where clinical trial is conducted

United States, 

References & Publications (1)

"Health Fact Sheet." Pew Research Center, Washington D.C. (December 16, 2013). http://www.pewinternet.org/fact-sheets/health-fact-sheet/.

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Other	Changes in anxiety on a visual analog scale	Comparing changes in anxiety (pre-clinical encounter vs. post-clinical encounter) among treatment arms. (Health Search vs. Standard Search).	Assessing a change in anxiety from baseline to up to one hour post clinical encounter.
Primary	Accuracy of patient's pre-visit differential diagnosis after Google searching on a tablet or mobile phone.	Proportion of patient's pre-visit differential diagnosis meeting the criteria of "match" with clinician post-visit differential diagnosis (i.e. Two of the three conditions on the clinician's differential diagnosis were more likely to be present in the patient's pre-visit assessment when a tablet or mobile phone was present).	Assessing diagnostic accuracy from baseline to up to one hour post-clinical encounter.
Secondary	Accuracy of differential diagnosis of Health Search vs. Standard Search	Proportion of patient's pre-visit differential diagnosis meeting the criteria of "match" with clinician post-visit differential diagnosis comparing Arm 1 (i.e. Health Search) vs. Arm 2 (i.e. Standard Search).	Assessing diagnostic accuracy from baseline to up to one hour post-clinical encounter.