Just What Is

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Just What Is Easy-to-Read Patient
Education Information?
Patricia A. Auflick Outreach Services
Librarian Arizona Health Sciences Library Tucson,
AZ
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Literacy
93 million adult Americans 45 of U.S.
population Basic Literacy skills sign a form
add amounts on a bank slip use a TV guide
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Migraine Collaboration
MedlinePlus Easy-to-Read Random Number Table 4
Readability Tests Flesch-Kincaid Grade
Fog Fry SMOG
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Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
Use Microsoft Word
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Gunning Fog Index

• Calculate the average number
• of words you use per sentence.
• Calculate the percentage of
• difficult words in the sample
• (words with three or more syllables).
• Add the totals together, and
• multiply the sum by 0.4.
• Algorithm (average_words_sentence
  number_words_three_syllables_plus) 0.4

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Fry

• Randomly select three 100-word
• passages from a book or an article.
• Plot the average number of syllables
• and the average number of sentences
• per 100 words on the graph to determine
• the grade level of the material.
• Choose more passages per book if great
• variability is observed and conclude that
• the book has uneven readability.
• Few books will fall into the solid black area,
• but when they do, grade level scores are
  invalid.

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SMOG

• Count 10 sentences in a row near
• the beginning of your material.
• Count 10 sentences in the middle.
• Count 10 sentences near the end.
• (30 total sentences)
• Count every word with three or
• more syllables in each group of
• sentences, even if the same word
• appears more than once.
• Add the total number of words
• counted. Use the SMOG Conversion
• Table I to find the grade level.

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Descriptive Statistics
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Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
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Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
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Conclusions

• Flesch-Kincaid Grade level
• provided the best results
• Web sites claiming to provide
• easy-to-read materials may
• not be doing so
• Define Easy-to-Read on web site

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Next Steps
Use Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level test on other
Easy-to-Read web sites Provide web page
designer/owner with readability test
results Recommend that web sites remove
documents above the easy-to-read grade level