Oncologyeducation.com: The development and use of a web-based educational resource for medical oncology professionals.

17538 Background: Improving physicians' access to information and continuing medical education (CME) opportunities will likely contribute to optimal patient care. The internet offers an innovative resource for medical oncology professionals (MOs) to share important medical advances. Hence, we surveyed Canadian MOs to determine their use of the internet, assessed their needs for an educational website and developed www.oncologyeducation.com based on that needs assessment. Here we describe the results of the survey and the use of the website since its launch in May 2007.,A structured survey was distributed by mail and email to Canadian MOs to assess their use of the internet and features they considered important in an educational website. Website statistics for Oncologyeducation.com from June 1, 2007 to Nov 30, 2007 was gathered using Google Analytics.,207/408 MOs responded to our survey for an overall response rate of 51%. 73% of respondents accessed the internet up to 10 hours weekly and the most common reasons for internet use were email, literature updates, answering clinical questions and accessing practice guidelines. Oncologyeducation.com currently has 239 registered members, which represents about 60% of Canadian MOs. The website received 4,350 visits from 2,059 unique visitors. 53% of visitors returned to Oncologyeducation.com at least once per month and 18% accessed the website more than 15 times per month. Although Canadian MOs represented the majority of visits, 30% came from 55 countries outside Canada. Visitors from developing countries viewed more pages and spent more time on site than visitors from developed countries. The most-viewed pages each month consistently included the medical oncologists' database search page, oncology conferences page, and informational update pages.,Oncologyeducation.com is used by Canadian and international visitors with the most popular pages reflecting content requested in the initial needs assessment. The numbers of international visitors suggest an opportunity to provide CME and informational updates for MOs worldwide especially in developing countries. No significant financial relationships to disclose.