Health Information and Digital Literacy
What this domain tests
This domain tests safe use of health information systems, data quality and privacy, digital professionalism, critical appraisal of evidence and recognition of misinformation. Questions ask you to judge the reliability and appropriate use of digital information.
Core rules
- Electronic health records must be accurate, complete, timely, secure and attributable. Data quality dimensions include accuracy, completeness, consistency, timeliness and validity.
- Privacy principles include lawful and fair processing, purpose limitation, data minimisation, accuracy, storage limitation, integrity and confidentiality, and accountability.
- Use unique login credentials, access only records needed for care, and never share passwords. Audit trails record who accessed what and when.
- Interoperability allows systems to exchange and use data meaningfully; it depends on standards, coding and consent.
- Frame clinical questions with PICO: population, intervention, comparison and outcome.
- Evidence hierarchies place systematic reviews and randomised controlled trials above observational studies and expert opinion for questions of effectiveness.
- Report relative and absolute effects. Relative risk reduction can look impressive while the absolute risk reduction is small; number needed to treat is the reciprocal of absolute risk reduction.
- Apply digital professionalism: no patient-identifiable information on personal devices or social media, and verify sources before sharing.
Worked example
A trial of 1,000 patients finds the event rate is 10% with treatment and 15% with control. Relative risk is 10 ÷ 15 = 0.67, a relative risk reduction of 33%. Absolute risk reduction is 15% − 10% = 5%, or 0.05. Number needed to treat is 1 ÷ 0.05 = 20. The reasoning is to calculate both relative and absolute measures, because the relative figure alone overstates the benefit for an individual patient.
Traps that cost marks
- Citing Wikipedia or a commercial health page as a primary evidence source.
- Treating correlation in observational data as causation.
- Sharing patient screenshots or identifiers on messaging apps.
- Using a colleague's login because your account is locked.
- Quoting relative risk reduction without the baseline risk or absolute effect.