A Readability Assessment of Intramuscular and Intravenous Injection Informed Consent Forms

Aim: Readability was defined as how easy or difficult to understand a written text by the readers with various mathematical formulas. The aim of this study was to evaluate the readability level of intravenous (IV) and intramuscular (IM) informed consent forms used in university hospitals, education and research hospitals, public hospitals and private hospitals in our country. Materials and Methods: A total of 90 (45 IM form and 45 IV form) informed consent form obtained from 45 hospital and were transferred to the computer software program developed by Bezirci-Y？lmaz. Word number, syllable number and words with syllable number of four and above were calculated. Ate？man and Bezirci-Y？lmaz formulas were used to determine the readability levels. The readability values of the informed consent forms of hospitals were compared. Results: The mean number of syllables, mean number of words and the average words with syllable number of four and above and the mean values of Ate？man and Bezirci-Y？lmaz mean scores were not statistically different between the hospitals (p=0.73, p=0.73, p=0.57, p=0.56 ve p=0.92 respectively). There were no statistically significant differences in the mean number of syllables, mean number of words, words with syllable number of four and above words, and the mean values of Ate？man and Bezirci-Y？lmaz in terms the hospital types (p=0.53, p=0.34, p =0.42, p=0.59 and p=0.53 respectively). Mean readability level was "moderately difficult" for all groups according to Ate？man formula and “secondary-high school” with Bezirci-Y？lmaz readability formula. Conclusion: In this study, it was determined that the readability of ？V and ？M informed consent forms used in hospitals was quite difficult. This study revealed that the revision of the informed consent forms and the level of readability should be improved to cover the general population