According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),
Personal health literacy is defined as :
“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”.
Confusing?
Let’s break it down in three parts!
FIND information and services to inform health-related decisions!
Where can you find information?
Common misunderstandings:
Let’s say that you are feeling ill, think that you may have a fever and feel a low-intensity but noticeable pain in the chest. You then remember that there is a local health center nearby and search their webpage. You search for your symptoms on their webpage and find that you might suffer from a respiratory disease, and you are recommended to visit a doctor in the local practice. What are your options? You can:
Obviously, you should follow the second option!
Let’s now see health literacy though this example.
Low health literacy increases the risk of:
With adequate health literacy, you can:
Let us review what we have learnt through the following video.