In this study, a Patients’ Information Privacy Scale (PIPS) and a Convenient Privacy Checklist (CPC) were developed, and the validity and reliability of the instruments were examined. This study was conducted in 3 stages: 1) Developing the Patients Information Privacy Scale, 2) Developing Convenient Privacy Checklist, and 3) Conducting a main test to examine those scales. A total of 595 patients were selected from 37 facilities in three prefectures, as samples for the main study. Valid response rates were 40.2%. The PIPS was analyzed using factor analysis. As a result, four factors, “Treatment-Related Information,” “Identification-Related Information,” “Daily Life-Behavior Related Information” and “Personal Life-Related Information” were extracted (Chronbach’s α=0.978). Through the examination of the criterion-related validity, construct validity, and stability, the PIPS was confirmed as a valid and reliable instrument. The CPC was analyzed by examination of representative nature of the items, the correlations between each CPC item and the factor of the PIPS, respectively. The result confirmed the efficiency of the checklist. This study shows that the PIPS and the CPC can be meaningful instruments in the evaluation of how to balance the right of information privacy against the practical needs for information sharing.

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 We investigated the web content accessibility of 80 university hospital websites in Japan. We scored accessibility by combining human evaluations with mechanical evaluations. In human evaluations the presence of visual information and ease of access were assessed by healthy persons, who checked them through a web browser. A full score was set at 100. The mechanical evaluation used the Fujitsu WebInspector 5.0 released by Fujitsu Ltd. The evaluation was based on the Japanese Industrial Standard, Guidelines for Older Persons and Persons with Disabilities― Information and Communications Equipment, Software and Services― Part 3 : Web Content (JIS X 8341-3:2004). A full score, in which there were no problems at all, was set at 0.0. Overall evaluations were obtained by subtracting the mechanical-based score from the human-based score.
 The Chiba University Hospital had the highest score (76.43) among the human evaluations. Kochi Medical School Hospital had the highest score (0.97) among the mechanical evaluations. Wakayama Medical University Hospital had the highest score (64.39) among the overall evaluations.
 Accessibility is still not sufficient, considering the fact that the hospital website with highest score among the overall evaluations achieved a score of only 64.39. Many sites may dramatically improve accessibility with small adjustments. We hope that university hospitals will improve the accessibility of their websites in the future.

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