HEALTH LITERACY: A RESEARCH PERSPECTIVE

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HEALTH LITERACY A RESEARCH PERSPECTIVE

• Kirsten McCaffery
• Associate Professor
• School of Public Health

• kirsten.mccaffery_at_sydney.edu.au

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BACKGROUND

• What we know
• Health Literacy is the result of the interaction
  between the individual and health system
• Low health literacy is common in Australia and
  other developed nations
• Associated with poor health outcomes (Berkman et
  al 2011)

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BACKGROUND

• What we dont know
• Debate about how to measure health literacy
• How best to improve health literacy or services
  to improve outcomes for a patients with low HL
• Some interventions have shown some success but
  much more research is needed (Sheridan et al
  2011). Successes in
• Presentation of information (eg. plain language)
• Risk communication formats
• Medicine labels
• Teach back

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BACKGROUND

• Research perspective what we want to achieve
• Work with health care providers, consumers and
  patients to improve HL in areas it is most needed
• Feasible and sustainable interventions which can
  make a difference
• Need to research and document the impact of
  interventions to add to the body of knowledge
  about HL
• Multidisciplinary approach needed

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CPC/WUN HL RESEARCH NETWORK

• Almost 200 members worldwide
• Over 10 collaborative research projects
• Website and members forum

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NETWORK DISCIPLINES

• Psychology
• Pharmacy
• Health Policy
• Adult Education
• ATSI Health
• Primary Care
• Public Health
• Media / Communications

Business Nursing Primary Care Clinical
Specialists Health Consumers Allied Health Health
Policy
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GOAL / VISION

• To conduct high quality, collaborative,
  cross-disciplinary HL research.
• To connect researchers with health practitioners
  and policy makers interested in HL to develop and
  evaluate sustainable solutions.
• Raise awareness of the problem of HL among the
  public, health professionals and policy makers.

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Research Areas
• Health literacy conceptual and measurement issues
• Health literacy in an age of digital
  communication 
• Health literacy and health inequalities including
  CALD groups
• Health literacy intervention development
• Integrating health literacy into health
  professional training
• Intervention development for consumers
• Participatory approaches to health literacy
  research

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HEALTH LITERACY PRIORITIES

• Issues for Australia
• How does Health Literacy fit with Shared Decision
  Making and moves to implement the latter?
• How can we better connect health care
  professionals in the field with HL researchers?
• Where are there opportunities to work with the
  Education sector?
• Need a collaborative, national approach

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THANK YOU

• Kirsten McCaffery
• Associate Professor
• School of Public Health

• kirsten.mccaffery_at_sydney.edu.au

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Areas
• Health literacy conceptual and measurement issues
• How can we clarify the HL construct?
• How can we best measure HL in individuals and
  organisations?

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Areas
• Health literacy in an age of digital
  communication
• How can we use digital technology to mitigate the
  impact of low HL?
•  

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Areas
• Health literacy and health inequalities including
  CALD (ethnic minority) groups
• How are low health literacy and health
  inequalities related?
• Can we reduce health inequalities by addressing
  health literacy?
• How do we address health literacy in CALD groups?

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Areas
• Integrating health literacy into health
  professional training
• What do health professionals know about health
  literacy?
• How do we train health professionals to
  communicate better to patients with low health
  literacy?
• How do we get organisations to better address the
  needs of low health literacy patients?

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CPC HEALTH LITERACY NODE

• Five Priority Areas
• Participatory approaches to health literacy
  research
• - How can we use participatory and action
  research methods to understand health literacy
  and reduce its impact on poor health?

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HL Node Project (gt10 projects) Lead
International survey of health professionals (NZ, Aus, UK, US) Prof Robyn Dixon (Auckland)
Chronic Kidney Disease (Aus, US) a) Cognition, HL and CKD b) HL review of patient materials c) Development of a HL patient App A/Prof Angela Webster (Sydney)
Maternal Health Literacy (US, Aus, UK) Dr Sandra Wilson (George Washington)
Informed decision making in pre-natal testing (Aus, Netherlands) Dr Sian Smith (UNSW)
Evaluation of a HL education program for social disadvantaged adults attending TAFE a) RCT in TAFE NSW (n300) b) Potential to expand to US and UK A/Prof Kirsten McCaffery (Sydney)
Adaptation of Bone Marrow Transplant materials for patients with low literacy. NSW Agency for Clinical Innovation A/Prof Kirsten McCaffery (Sydney)
Grants submitted HL elements submitted to NHMRC ARC re CALD and Primary Care EBM/SDM Translation. Prof Phyllis Butow Prof Paul Glasziou







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CPC HL Research Network

• Join HL Research Network
• health.literacy_at_sydney.edu.au
• www.sydney.edu.au/healthliteracy