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Explaining juvenile idiopathic arthritis to paediatric patients using illustrations and easy-to-read texts:
Christiane Reiser1, Nina A Zeltner2, Beatrix Rettenbacher3
1Department of Paediatrics, LKH Bregenz, Bregenz, Austria. Christiane.reiser@lkhb.at.
Insights
Newly developed educational materials significantly improved disease knowledge and self-efficacy in children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). These easy-to-read resources, featuring custom illustrations, aim to enhance patient understanding and adherence to JIA therapy.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Rheumatology
- Medical Education
- Health Communication
Background:
- Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is a prevalent chronic rheumatic condition in children.
- Effective JIA management necessitates a thorough understanding of the disease and its treatment options for improved patient adherence.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and evaluate specifically designed illustrations and standardized, easy-to-read texts for educating children and adolescents with JIA.
- To assess the comprehensibility and content validity of these educational materials.
- To test the hypothesis that these materials would increase children's knowledge about JIA.
Main Methods:
- Illustrations were created by a graphic artist, and informative texts were simplified into easy-to-read language.
- A modular system was employed to allow for individualized patient information.
- The materials were tested for knowledge gain and self-efficacy improvement in children with JIA and control groups, with health-related quality of life (HRQoL) also assessed.
Main Results:
- Testing involved 38 JIA patients and 46 controls (median age 11 years).
- Both groups showed significant knowledge gain post-intervention (p < 0.001).
- Patients demonstrated a greater enhancement in self-efficacy, and no negative impact on HRQoL was observed.
Conclusions:
- Developing clear, jargon-free explanations of juvenile rheumatic diseases and treatments is crucial in pediatric rheumatology.
- Custom illustrations and simplified texts effectively improve disease knowledge in both JIA patients and healthy children.
- The developed educational materials enhance self-efficacy in pediatric patients and support therapeutic adherence.
Introduction:
Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is the leading chronic rheumatic disease in childhood. To achieve adherence to therapy, in-depth understanding of disease and treatment options are important.
Objective:
Development of specifically designed illustrations and standardised, easy-to-read texts for children and adolescents with JIA. Education materials were tested for comprehensibility and content validity. We hypothesised that children would be able to increase their knowledge about JIA after presentation of materials.
Methods:
The illustrations were designed by a graphic artist and the informative texts consecutively transformed to easy-to-read language. The materials appear as a modular system to allow individualized information for each patient. The illustrations and texts were tested for knowledge gain and improvement of self-efficacy in children affected by JIA/ rheumatic diseases and controls. Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) was tested as an overall assessment of patients' well-being.
Results:
46 controls (71% female) and 38 patients (48% female) with a median age of 11 years were tested in a standardised setting. In both groups knowledge gain was significant (controls: t (44) = 11.08, p < 0.001, d = 1.65; patients: t (37) = 7.48, p < 0.001, d = 1.21). The control group had a significantly higher enhancement of disease knowledge compared to patients' group (p = .046) The follow-up testing was only performed in one school class (20 controls) due to Covid-19 pandemic with significant improvement compared to the pre-test results (p = .002). The enhancement of self-efficacy through the teaching session was significantly higher in the patients' group. No impairment of HRQoL was seen.
Conclusion:
Explaining juvenile rheumatic diseases and therapeutic strategies is an important task in paediatric rheumatology. To avoid incomprehensible explanations in medical jargon, illustrations and easy-to-read texts were developed. Standardised presentation of the newly created materials resulted in a significant improvement of disease knowledge in patients and controls in addition to an enhancement of self-efficacy in patients.
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