Access to food safety recommendations for the elderly on the world wide web

INTRODUCTION: The elderly suffer greater complications from, and mortality associated with, foodborne illness. There is a need to ensure that education material is available to inform the elderly of increased risks, proper food handling and specific foods to avoid. Research described here assessed the availability of food safety information for the elderly on the World Wide Web. METHODS: A list of eight search terms related to both food safety and elderly health was developed. Using these terms, basic food safety websites as well as general elderly health websites were identified. The first 20 sites for each term were assessed for content regarding food safety for the elderly using a ten-question assessment tool. The tool evaluated the websites' provision of basic food safety information, increased risks for elderly adults and inclusion of unique food safety guidelines for the elderly such as the recommendation to reheat lunchmeat. RESULTS: Of 160 identified sites, 12 duplicates were eliminated. Of general food safety websites, 12% provided information about the elderly on their main pages. In contrast, 65% of elderly health sites provided information about food safety on their main pages. Of the sites lacking elderly food safety information on the main page, a more exhaustive analysis of the entire site did in fact yield food safety information for the elderly for 45% of the sites. DISCUSSION: While food safety information and increased risks for elderly are available on the web there is a need to increase access to such materials, especially on food safety websites.