Module 10 - Health Literacy

Confused with health [digital image]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.epha.org/a/6144

Health Literacy is more than just how well a consumer locates, understands and applies health information to support and promote healthy well-being, it also incorporates previous experiences, existing knowledge, educational level, social skills, self-assurances, personal beliefs and motivation of each individual when making changes relating to health (Riva, Antonietti, Iannello & Pravettoni, 2015). The way healthcare services and health information is provided also determines what you know, what options you have and what you do about your health. Health education is the key, but being actively engaged and motivated towards making changes to improve your health is the lock, and both are needed for health literacy (Davis, Swarbrick, Krzos, Ruppert & O’Neill, 2015).  

 

                         

What is health literacy? [digital image]. (n.d.).

 Retrieved from http://www.safetyandquality.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Infographic-What-is-health-literacy.jpg

People with inadequate health literacy are prone to avoid preventative health measures (Al Sayah, Majumdar & Johnson, 2015), have higher hospital admittance rates, unmanageable and undiagnosed chronic illnesses, non-compliant with medications and treatments, and puts a financial strain on the Government healthcare system (Mantwill, Monestel-Umaña & Schulz, 2015). Governments recognise that preventative health is more cost-effective than treatment, and the empowerment of health promotion and education was introduced to limit unnecessary mortalities, health detriments and risk factors in communities and on a national scale (Weiss, 2015). Health promotion is not only targeted to actively achieve better health goals and reduce disease, but preventative health campaigns like "Slip, Slop, Slap", "Life, be in it" and "Quit Smoking" were released to educate the population on environmental factors that influenced health (Kim, Lim, & Park, 2015).

Supporting our aging, youth (Coles, Ravid, Gibb, George-Denn, Bronstein, & McLeod, 2016), ethnic (Rikard, Hall & Bullock, 2015), poorly educated, lower socio-economic, vulnerable and disadvantaged population to increasing healthcare literacy will preserve their need for health services (Han, Boyle, James, Yu & Bennett, 2015). Consumers with low health literacy have difficulty in understanding their choices to make the best decision with their health, resulting in poorer outcomes to health and well-being. Creating an easier health literacy environment will provide better awareness of self-sufficiency in the management of healthcare (Nouri & Rudd, 2015).

In an interview with Peter Ryan, a wonderful storyteller who has been vision impaired for over 20 years, discussed the challenges of living with a vision-impaired disability. He shared his lived experiences with dealing with his depression in coping with the loss of his eyesight, and factored his acceptance to a simple lifestyle as his success. He details active listening, human touch, empathy, advocating and common sense as important considerations when dealing with people with disabilities, and expressed concern to the diminishing level of care provided in healthcare that is insensitive to his needs. This highlights the need for therapeutic relationships to be more holistically person-centred, taking the time to acknowledge the persons complete physical, mental and emotional needs, and not just focussing on the disability (Harrison & Lazard, 2015).

Self Reflection: This module has educated me to take further steps to ensure my clients fully understand the health education I am giving them, so that they have the correct information to make an informed decision towards their health, and that in doing so in my future nursing career will reduce the risk of harm to my clients.

References

Al Sayah, F., Majumdar, S. R., & Johnson, J. A. (2015). Association of Inadequate Health Literacy with Health Outcomes in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes and Depression: Secondary Analysis of a Controlled Trial. Canadian Journal Of Diabetes, 39(4), 259-265 7p. doi:10.1016/j.jcjd.2014.11.005

Coles, M. E., Ravid, A., Gibb, B., George-Denn, D., Bronstein, L. R., & McLeod, S. (2016). Adolescent mental health literacy: Young people's knowledge of depression and social anxiety disorder. Journal Of Adolescent Health, 58(1), 57-62. doi:10.1016/j.jadohealth.2015.09.017

Davis, K., Swarbrick, P., Krzos, I. M., Ruppert, S., & O’Neill, S. (2015). Health literacy training: A model for effective implementation and sustainability. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal, 38(4), 377-379. doi:10.1037/prj0000166

Han, S. D., Boyle, P. A., James, B. D., Yu, L., & Bennett, D. A. (2015). Poorer financial and health literacy among community-dwelling older adults with mild cognitive impairment. Journal Of Aging And Health, 27(6), 1105-1117. doi:10.1177/0898264315577780

Harrison, T., & Lazard, A. (2015). Advocating for a population-specific health literacy for people with visual impairments. Health Communication, 30(12), 1169-1172. doi:10.1080/10410236.2015.1037424

Kim, Y., Lim, J. Y., & Park, K. (2015). Effects of health literacy and social capital on health information behavior. Journal Of Health Communication, 20(9), 1084-1094. doi:10.1080/10810730.2015.1018636

Mantwill, S., Monestel-Umaña, S., & Schulz, P. J. (2015). The Relationship between Health Literacy and Health Disparities: A Systematic Review. Plos ONE, 10(12), 1-22. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0145455

Nouri, S. S., & Rudd, R. E. (2015). Health literacy in the 'oral exchange': An important element of patient–provider communication. Patient Education And Counseling, 98(5), 565-571. doi:10.1016/j.pec.2014.12.002

Rikard, R. V., Hall, J. K., & Bullock, K. (2015). Health literacy and cultural competence: A model for addressing diversity and unequal access to trauma-related health care. Traumatology, 21(3), 227-236. doi:10.1037/trm0000044

Riva, S., Antonietti, A., Iannello, P., & Pravettoni, G. (2015). What are judgment skills in health literacy? A psycho-cognitive perspective of judgment and decision-making research. Patient Preference & Adherence, 91677-1686. doi:10.2147/PPA.S90207

Weiss, B. D. (2015). Health literacy research: Isn’t there something better we could be doing?. Health Communication, 30(12), 1173-1175. doi:10.1080/10410236.2015.1037421