During health literacy month, the UAMS Center for Health Literacy is urging healthcare professionals to take a pledge to stop using jargon that is hard to understand and instead use words that people know the first time they hear or read them.
Blog
Celebrate Health Literacy Month
Effective health communication is imperative for improving health outcomes in patients and community members. Join in the webinar to learn about the implications of health literacy and a few best practices for improving communication with your patients or program participants, including teach-back.
Field Testing: The Gold Standard for Assessing Your Materials
Have you ever wondered why your patients don’t follow your instructions – even when you gave them an easy-to-read handout? If this puzzles you, consider this: Despite its reading level, the handout may not be understandable or have the information needed for the reader to act.
Readability: Is that your final answer?
How many times have you heard someone talk about a document’s “reading level”? Or heard someone say, “Readability is between 6th and 8th grade, so it is a good document.” If your goal is to check a box and meet an organizational policy, well done. But, if your goal is to help a reader understand a health topic so they can improve their health, readability stats aren’t the way to win the game.
Cut it out! Part 4
While many writers (ahem, doctors and scientists) still love passive voice, it puts most of us to sleep. It adds unnecessary words to sentences. And worst of all, it often hides the subject of the sentence so your readers cannot tell who is saying or doing what.
Cut it out! Part 3
It is easy to say too much. Our words run away with us. This can get us into trouble. In some cases, though, those extra words don’t mean anything. They make sentences long and clunky. And they can distract people from our key messages.
Cut it out! Part 2
Our writing is often full of unnecessary words. We say the same things over and over again, repeating ourselves, adding different words that mean the same thing. (See what we did there?)
Cut it out! Part 1
Most writing is full of unnecessary words. We say “her personal physician” instead of “her physician” and “your medical doctor” instead of “your doctor.” We spice-up emails with “at the present time” instead of the simple “now.”
New Year’s Resolutions for Health Communication
We know, we know. No one keeps their New Year’s resolutions. This year, try something different.
Instead of trying to lose weight or eat less, resolve to help others! And where better to start than helping people understand and use health information?
Help! I have number problems.
Health literacy is not just about reading and listening. It is also about numbers. The ability to make sense of numbers—especially risks and benefits—is essential to adequate health literacy.