It is essential to critically appraise all sources used to inform clinical practice in line with the principles of evidence-based practice. As grey literature is not peer-reviewed, it is especially important to critically appraise grey literature before using it to inform clinical practice.
The AACODS Checklist is a straightforward framework for evaluating the quality and trustworthiness of grey literature. As grey literature varies in its content, scope, and organization, this checklist is broad and widely applicable to different information sources.
Lateral reading is an information evaluation technique most often used to evaluate claims on websites and in other, less formal sources. Lateral reading is the simple practice of:
Using lateral reading, the goal is to evaluate a website or publication's authority, using the Process, Expertise, Aim framework.
Process - a reliable source for facts should have a process in place for encouraging accuracy, verifying facts, and correcting mistakes
Expertise - do the author(s) of a text have domain or disciplinary expertise?
Aim - what is the publication, author, website, etc attempting to accomplish?