Q. How do I cite a health policy website in APA format?

This can vary depending on what information you are citing on a website. If you are citing an entire website, not just a page or some other specific content on the site, then you can simply cite the website in-text and do not need to add it to the reference list.

For example: The Urban Institute is a useful place to find resources supporting policy change (http://www.urbaninstitute.org).

However, if you are paraphrasing, quoting, or citing for background support a particular document on a website you should include a reference that is specific to that source of information. Information on websites can vary widely in terms of content and format but this general format can be used in most cases:

Author, A. (date). Title of document [Format description]. Retrieved from http://URL

What if you don't have an author or are missing some other piece of information? Here is a handy chart from the APA Style blog you can use to determine how to format your entries with missing information. However, often the information for your citation can be found. Look for copyright dates in the footer and if you are wondering which title to use for a page, be sure to use the one that makes the most sense in regards to the specific information you are citing.

You might also be wondering what to use for format descriptions in the square brackets. Some examples include [Web log post], [Video file], and [Online forum comment]. However, in many instances for traditional Web pages no description will be used.

What if you have multiple pages from the same Website you want to cite? The APA Style blog includes examples about how to address this situation in their post here. It also includes examples where format type is not used.