Health Literacy

What is Health Literacy?

Healthy People 2030 recognizes two components of health literacy, personal health literacy and organizational health literacy.

Personal health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

Organizational health literacy is the degree to which organizations equitably enable individuals to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

What is the Aim of Health Literacy?

On the organizational health literacy front, its goals include promoting changes in the health care system that improve communication, informed decision-making, and access to culturally and linguistically appropriate health information and services.

Why is Health Literacy Important?

Health literacy can help us prevent health problems, protect our health, and better manage health problems when they arise. They aren’t familiar with medical terms or how their bodies work. They have to interpret statistics and evaluate risks and benefits that affect their health and safety.

Most written health information materials use language that exceeds the reading level of the intended audience.

The receipt of the materials alone is not enough. Comprehension and understanding of health information is key to improving health outcomes.

Some patients may have disparities between written and verbal fluency, and stigma around low literacy levels may lead to exaggeration of reading ability.

Communication barriers impact verbal interactions between patients and providers.

Conversations are often brief, involving complex medical jargon, and from a patient perspective can feel largely one-sided. Patients should be engaged in a way that makes them feel comfortable and able to listen and ask questions.

In rural areas with fewer healthcare providers overall, a lack of culturally and ethnically diverse healthcare providers that reflect the population can lead to distrust and ineffective communication.

Clear and open communication between patients and providers plays a major role in treatment adherence to help prevent serious health complications and hospitalizations.

Conditions associated with living in poverty, like health insurance status (being un- or under-insured can impact health literacy levels)

Low educational attainment, which is often associated with more limited levels of health literacy

Racial and ethnic minority groups with limited English proficiency who report having low health literacy levels

A lack of resources and infrastructure to address limited health literacy

For example, approximately 22% of rural Americans and 28% of tribal communities lack access to broadband. Broadband has been shown to improve access to education and telehealth services.

Our role as a public health advocate:

Our public

1-Improve the Usability of health Information

2- Improve the Usability of health services

3- Build Knowledge to improve Decision Making

4- Advocate for health Literacy Improvement