Are Health Websites Ready For the Mobile World? A Study of Readability Among Traditional and Mobile Websites

Abstract

By 2015, mobile devices will be more popular than personal computers to access online information. This expected shift is particularly important for health information, as the near ubiquitous penetration of mobile phones will present new opportunities to disseminate information to traditionally hard-to-reach populations. This study asks whether the mobile websites of health organizations have taken into consideration the greater difficulty of reading text on the small screens of mobile phones. Specifically, this study examines readability scores of traditional websites and mobile websites among 55 American health organizations. While 22% of the organizations studied had mobile websites, only one-third of the mobile websites had better readability than their traditional website counterparts. The Grade Level Score for these mobile websites averaged 6.5 compared to 8.5 for their traditional websites, and none had the recommended superior readability scores of 5th grade level or lower. Conversely, another one-third of the mobile websites had worse readability than their traditional website counterparts. These findings suggest most health organizations have yet to truly leverage the greater accessibility of online information through mobile phones.