Health Literacy: Home

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention define two forms of 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 (CDC, 2020).
• 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 (CDC, 2020) .

The main ways you can improve your own health literacy or advocate for your patients are: 

• Use or request plain language in medical settings. Plain language makes sure patients and professionals are on the same page when discussing health topics. 
• Use or request visual aids. Sometimes, just seeing the image of where a problem is located can help in the understanding of medical care. 
• Ask clarifying questions. Patients: advocating for your own health can start with asking questions if an idea is not clear. Professionals: if you are not sure a patient understands something, ask what they can explain back to you to identify gaps in information. 

The resources in this guide are meant to help provide background information and assistive resources to further your health literacy journey, but the action is always your decision!