Improving Health Equity Through Health Literacy Education

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Health Communication
• Health Literacy

Background:

• Limited health literacy affects over one-third of US adults, leading to poor health outcomes.
• Physician training in health communication strategies for diverse literacy levels is often insufficient in residency programs.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate a curriculum for family medicine residents focused on effective health communication across varying health literacy levels.
• To establish evidence-based recommendations for health literacy communication training.

Main Methods:

• A 6-month multimodal curriculum was implemented for 39 residents, including conferences, video reviews, feedback, and supervision.
• Pre-/post-measures included patient surveys, observed patient encounters (videos), and resident self-assessments.

Main Results:

• Residents showed significant improvements in knowledge and attitudes regarding health literacy.
• Observed communication skills improved, with increased use of plain language and decreased jargon.
• Use of specific communication techniques improved significantly based on self-surveys and video observations.

Conclusions:

• Multimodal interventions effectively enhance residents' knowledge, attitudes, and practical skills in health literacy communication.
• The developed curriculum provides a foundation for evidence-based training to improve physician-patient communication for all literacy levels.