In Chapter 13, The Author discuss the problem of health literacy in United States and its effects in health care out come. Author has defines the Health Literacy as the degree to which an individual has to capacity to obtain, communicate, process and, understand basic health information and services to make appropriate decision. On the other hand the organization health literacy is their capabilities to overcome barriers of health literacy. In a health survey only few patients (12-15%) were found at proficient level of the health literacy and more than 50% patients falls in moderate level. Data of health literacy shows that it is a big problem that has to be worked to achieve healthcare out come. Author has discussed the advantages of the functional health literacy in patients because it helps patients to understand basic medical terminology used by the physicians, increase adherence and self management behavior and more likely to receive quality medical care. Functional Health literacy increase the participation of the patients in preventive health care. …show more content…
Individual-level barrier of health literacy includes the individual characteristics like age , language, education and the socioeconomic background of the patient, complexity of illness and treatment and prior experience and exposure of the health care system. Educated patients who has not been aware of the heath care system also found difficulties in filling healthcare forms and the other documents. We have seen the best example of the patient, who has not aware of signing the documents and gave consent for surgery. Patients find it difficult to follow the providers instruction and not aware of the basic terminology. Reading , writing and calculation of basic math is considered as the minimum literacy requirement to understand and use healthcare
According to Penner et al. (2013), there are various causes of healthcare disparities, such as socioeconomic status; this results to poor healthcare services for people with low socioeconomic status, as people with low pay find it difficult to leave their work to seek healthcare help, or to afford healthcare insurance (p.4). The second cause is language proficiency. The language barriers faced by the immigrant plays a role in the healthcare disparities among the racial or ethnic minority patients. Another cause is health literacy. The levels of the health literacy among the foreign born individuals can be influenced by their higher level of distrust of the healthcare providers and healthcare system than they have towards Caucasian people. This, in turn, leads them to seek healthcare information less often than their Caucasian counterparts, thus hindering the provision of quality services, as well as limiting the foreign patients’ ability to manage their health conditions effectively. The foreigners’ failure to easily accept the information provided to them by healthcare providers puts them at risk. Disentangling the role of health literacy in racial healthcare disparities from the effects of racial attitudes and beliefs is often hard (Penner et al,
pp. 197-205 Singleton, K., & Krause, E. (2009). Understanding cultural and linguistic barriers to health literacy. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 14(3). United Nations.
A hospital visit causes much stress and anxiety for anyone. Hence, as a healthcare professional, you want to ensure that the patient receives high-quality service and satisfaction regarding their health during their hospital stay. Upon research, it was evident that minority patients that have difficultly speaking English or the native language have poor satisfaction and receive poor-quality of healthcare due to the communication barriers. Communication barriers such as language differences, cultural and religious background cause complexity and dilemmas at the hospital for both the doctor and patient. Hence, to reduce this barrier, cultural experts should be employed in hospitals as an official policy so all hospitals are aware of all their patients’ background and will be comply and respect the decisions made. After all, everyone should be able to understand and communicate information regarding one’s health without struggles and miscommunication regardless they speak the native language or not. Miscommunication is the last thing you want at a hospital as it would cause anxiety and fear for anyone if the medical doctor could not help you understand your
In caring for patients in the hospital setting today one must look at variety of patients from various background. Healthcare providers should be aware of patients’ culture, beliefs and attitude to provide quality care. The Office of Minority Health of the Federal Government has developed a set of 14 principles called the CLAS Standards (Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services), which are mainly directed at healthcare organization, and are mandated for all organizations receiving Federal funds. The focus is on the terms of linguistic services and efforts to provide information to patients in their own language through availability of brochures, interpreters, and other means. In this essay I would like to exam cultural considerations with emphasis on impaired verbal communication related to language barrier, because I feel that communication barrier can cause a reduction in healthcare quality and low patient satisfaction.
Boosting good quality information for patients, their families and the public was a duty in the National Health Service(NHS) Plan (July 2000, chapter 10) and part of the proposals in the Kennedy Report into the Bristol Royal Infirmary (July 2001, section 2, chapter 23) all cited in Department of Health (DH) (2008). Producing quality information to patients and members of the public will not only allow them to interpret their health needs but also enable them to make right decision for themselves and their families (DH, 2006). One of the methods of doing this is through health education which is one of the components of health promotion (Naidoo and Wills, 2009; Ewles and Simnett, 2003; Brooker and Waught, 2007). Health education can be described as: helping people to enhance and take control their own health; influencing people to decide and support healthful practices; delivering information; raising understanding of health issues and circumstances leading to ill health just to mention a few (Brooker and Waught, 2007; Naidoo and Wills, 2009; Ewles and Simnett, 2003).
Conaty-Buck, S. (2009). Unblocking barriers: Clearing the channel to improve communication between practitioners and patients with low health literacy. (Order No. 3364864, University of Virginia). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, , 121. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.uproxy.library.dc-uoit.ca/docview/305011452?accountid=14694. (305011452).
Health literacy can have a major impact on the health of a patient. This is because if the patient is unable to comprehend the information that is being provided to them by the health professional, they will not be able to take fully informed decisions regarding their health. When a health professional is communicating information to a patient they need to take a step back and evaluate how the patient is comprehending the information they are providing. This essay looks at two main topics. The first one is what health literacy is and how an individual's knowledge can influence how they how see and approach their own health. Second is what strategies a nurse can use to provide better outcomes for themselves and their patients when it comes to health literacy. Included is a personal reflection, which looks at how this student found preparing and conducting a teaching session on food safety to a class in a health literacy setting.
It is up to the healthcare professionals to assess and evaluate the patient's learning needs and readiness to learn because everyone learns differently. Healthcare is very sensitive industry because human life is attached to it. Barriers during teaching patients or learning for patients might cost life and law suite. For example, if the patient is sick, the probability for the client to have the interest to learn is unlikely. Therefore, I have to ask the patient what he needs and what interest him from other healthcare professional around. By doing so, I can increase the interest of the client/patient to learn the information I am looking to provide him/her/them. Therefore, by gathering important information from the patients how best they prefer to receive the information and involving other health care team on finding out the effective way of the information can be productive are the best way to overcome the barriers of learning in healthcare
All individuals across the world strive to acquire high levels of competence and literacy across all aspects of education. It is human nature to maintain good health, and to educate ourselves on how to sustain prominent, fulfilling lifestyles. In application to health, the first step in achieving adequate health requires one to know where to locate reliable information. Not only is it important to understand what it takes to create health, but also the process of preserving healthy habits at all times. The construct of Health Literacy illustrates this notion entirely—and can be defined as the capacity to obtain, communicate, process, and understand basic health information and services to make appropriate health decisions (CDC.gov).
As for health professionals, especially nurses, the main duty of the job is to provide health education to the community and need to ensure the clients understand health instruction and information, thus, health literacy plays a pragmatic role in health care. In addition, nurses need to provide health service and care to the community which included different age groups, gender and cultural or ethnic groups, therefore, nurses need to be culturally appropriate and also need to understand The Treaty of Waitangi to ensure it is cultural safe for the society. Moreover, it is important to understand how should nurses related their own action and their health philosophy, as a result, can help nurses to identify their role. Hence, it is crucial to
Many organizations and healthcare institutions are active members in improving quality of care thru health literacy. The Joint Commission’s Public Policy Initiative begun in 2001, work at safe quality health care thru increased health literacy. Healthy People 2010 report presents safety and health literacy as a goal. recent national action focus on removing barriers.7 This is reinforced by provisions in the Affordable Care Act and the Plain Writing Act. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality(AHRQ) published the Health Literacy Universal Precautions Toolkit, a self-assessment tool to direct quality increase in health literacy in primary care. The toolkit is built on the rules of the universal precautions, to help guide the healthcare professionals to create health materials understandable to the patients. The National Action Plan to Improve Health Literacy is a policy document to use to improve health literacy. The policy is founded on two values (1) everyone has the right to health information that helps them make informed decisions and (2) health services should be delivered in ways that are understandable and beneficial to health, longevity, and quality of life (Healthy People 2020). Effective communication is a cornerstone of patient safety (The Joint Commission, 2007, p. 5). Health literacy is a factor in engaging patients in preventive care (The Joint Commission, 2007, p. 28). The Joint Commission’s
Health literacy is a term not widely understood by the general population. It is defined as “the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information needed to make appropriate health decisions and services needed to prevent or treat illness,” (About health literacy, 2014). A person’s level of health literacy is based on their age, education level, socioeconomic standing, and cultural background. Patients with low health literacy have a more difficult time navigating the health care system. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, this group of patients may find it harder to find medical services and health care providers, fill out health forms, provide their complete medical history with their providers, seek preventative care, understand the health risks associated with some behaviors, taking care of chronic health conditions, and understanding how to take prescribed medications (About health literacy, 2014). It is to a certain extent the patient’s responsibility to increase their own health literacy knowledge. But to what extent can they learn on their own? Those working in the health field have been trained to navigate the health system and understand the medical terms. They have the knowledge and capability to pass on that understanding to their patients. Health care professionals have a shared responsibility to help improve patients’ health literacy.
Merging multi-literacies in Health and Physical Education could allow students to talk about topics of the genre more successfully and have knowledge of Health and Physical Education terms and language in daily life. According to Nutbeam (2000) interactive health literacy is a term which outlines the individual inspiration to maintain personal health. By teaching skills in the primary years to communicate and cope with health issues and physical activity will assist students in the schools of South Australia to know their personal requirements.
Health literacy plays an important role in individuals’ decision-making. The scope of health literacy does not limit to traditional medical perspective. In fact, it has extended from the basic understanding of diseases and medications to all aspects that affect health. As one of the key social determinants, health literacy has huge impact on health and well-being. Its influence is associated with disease prevention, healthy lifestyle promotion, policy making, etc. This essay will first discuss the concept of health literacy and the consequences that link to it, and then give a strategy—designing user-centred messages in education, to improve health literacy,
There has been a great deal of attention given by individuals, the media and by the government to Health Education. There is no doubt that a population which is “health literate” is significant for the sake of the “public health as a whole and consequently for public finances”(Tappe 2013) (Younghee 2013) Many countries including the U.S. have realized just how vitally this issues has become. (Younghee 2013) Sadly however, the ability understand basic health information, with or without health education, as well as access and process the services is only possessed by “50%”of the American public, resulting in the escalation or health care costs as well as poor decision making regarding health care. (Mancuso 2011) Yet the fact is that over the years at local, state, and institutional levels, health educators have been very successfully advocating to influence smoking regulations, child safety seat policies, nutrition policies, and many other health policies and regulations still a stunning “98.0%” of them report “barriers to policy activity”. (Bliss 2013)