|
Health
and Literacy
"46% of
Americans are functionally illiterate in dealing with the health
care system."
This astounding
statistic is one of many which indicate the social crisis this country
is facing with implications for both health care providers and adult
education practitioners. Studies have established a direct link
between literacy levels and health status. Functional Health Literacy
is needed for patients to read consent forms, medicine labels and
other written health care information. In addition, patients must
be able to understand written and oral directions from doctors,
nurses and pharmacists.
These health
brochures were developed through a Florida Department of Education
grant to Leon County Schools Adult & Community Education in
cooperation with the Florida Adult Basic Education Practitioners'
Committee. The brochures are designed to be used with individuals
with limited literacy skills in an effort to provide information
on the health topics at a level understandable to the individual.
The brochure
titled If Your Patient Can't Read is designed for health care professionals
to provide an awareness of the issues of limited literacy individuals
and to generate a consciousness of the issue when dealing with patients.
The brochures
may be reproduced for use in an adult education setting or with
a community setting as appropriate. Feedback and information on
the use of the brochures is always welcome. To share feedback or
for information, please contact Lynn Cunill at cunilll@ACE-Leon.org
.
The following PDF documents can be viewed and printed out with
the Adobe
Acrobat Reader, which is available free of charge from the Adobe
website. You can save these documents on your own computer. Click
the above graphic or click
here to go to the download site.
|