Internet and stroke awareness in the young Hungarian population

Background – Although stroke mortality rate in Hungary has tapered off over the last years, it is still twice the European average. This statistic is alarming and a coordinated response is needed to deal with this situation when considering new ways of communication. There are currently more than 300 websites in Hungarian related to stroke prevention, acute stroke treatment, recovery and rehabilitation. Aims and/or hypothesis – We sought to identify base level of stroke knowledge of the Hungarian students and the efficiency with which the knowledge disseminated by internet is actually utilized. Methods – We surveyed 321 high-school and university students to determine their ability to extract specific information regarding stroke from Hungarian websites. The base level of knowledge was established by asking 15 structured, close-ended questions. After completing the questionnaire, students were asked to search individually on stroke in the internet where all the correct answers were available. After a 25-min search session they answered the same questionnaire. We recorded and analyzed all their internet activity during the search period. Results – The students displayed a fair knowledge on the basics of stroke but their results did not change significantly after the 25-min search (53±13% vs. 63±14%). Only correct information given on demographic facts improved significantly. Most of the students used very simple search strategies and engines and only the first 5-10 web-pages were visited. Conclusion – Analysis of the most often visited web-pages revealed that although stroke-related Hungarian web-based resources contain almost all the important and required information the unsuitable structure, lack of simplicity and verbosity hinder their effective public utilization