Promoting Health Literacy: Finding Consumer Health Resources and Writing Health Materials for Patients

摘要

With the advent of the Plain Writing Act of 2010 under the Obama Administration, Federal agencies, such as the Centers for Disease Control have been mandated to implement strategies and processes to make language plain and understandable to lay audiences at a myriad of literacy levels. The purpose of the law is: "To enhance citizen access to Government information and services by establishing that Government documents issued to the public must be written clearly, and for other purposes" (1). Traditionally, in health care, the responsibility has been on the consumer or patient to gain the health literacy skills to navigate and understand the health care system; however, that is shifting. As the shifting responsibility from patient to the agency or provider is occurring, health care providers must lessen the burden on patients and promote a health-literate health care environment. There is a need for understanding what health literacy is, how it particularly affects patients with low literacy skills, and what can be done to promote a health literate health care environment. Librarians have the opportunity to promote health literacy by providing patients access to high-quality patient education and consumer health materials. Librarians in all settings should have the skills to connect patients to high-quality consumer information written on a level patients can understand. Librarians in hospital settings also have the opportunity to work with health care providers to promote health literacy by providing health care providers with the skills to write patient materials that are understandable to consumers.