Health Information: Health literacy

Health information > Health literacy

Definitions

NHS England describes Health Literacy as "Health literacy describes the personal characteristics and social resources needed for individuals and communities to access, understand, appraise and use information and services to make decisions about health."

The World Health Organisation uses the definition, "Health literacy implies the achievement of a level of knowledge, personal skills and confidence to take action to improve personal and community health by changing personal lifestyles and living conditions...."

Factors influencing the health literacy of a group/ individual can be attributed to socioeconomic circumstance: poor education, limited financial resources, poor quality jobs and weak social connections. Poor health literacy predicts poor diet, smoking, and poor physical exercise. It is associated with increased risk of morbidity, premature death in older adults and incurs a cost to the NHS estimated at between £2.95bn and £4.92bn. For more information, see Public Health England's Local Action on Health Inequalities: Improving Health Literacy to reduce Health inequalities (2015).

Techniques

Image from Knowledge for Healthcare (KFH) depicting the 5 techniques to improve Health Literacy when healthcare staff communicate with patients/ clients.

Training 

Health literacy is about people having enough knowledge, understanding, skills and confidence to use health information, to be active partners in their care, and to navigate health and social care systems.

You can try the Health Literacy e-learning module on eLearning for Healthcare https://portal.e-lfh.org.uk/Component/Details/600363

The Health Literacy session gives a brief overview of why health literacy is important and an introduction to some techniques that can improve health literacy.

In addition to the e-learning module, the library service can provide bite-sized sessions.

This session gives a brief overview of why health literacy is important and an introduction to some techniques that can improve health literacy.

For more Information about our training session, please contact bht.clinicallibrarians@nhs.net