Health Literacy

"The degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate decisions."
(Parker & Ratzan, 2001)

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ACP Foundation's Focus on Health Literacy

Definition
The Foundation has adopted the definition of health literacy developed for the National Library of Medicine and used by Healthy People 2010:

"The degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate decisions."
(Parker & Ratzan, 2001)

Target Audience
The patients of internists, with special emphasis on Medicare patients with chronic illness.

Goal
To improve the health of the public by increasing patients' ability to obtain, process, and understand basic health information needed to make appropriate decisions that impact their health.

Objectives

I.	Promote shared understanding and informed decision making.
II.	Reduce medical errors and improve health care quality.
III.	Improve health outcomes.
IV.	Reduce waste and inefficiency
V.	Reduce cultural and language barriers to improve health literacy.

Background and Evidence for Focus
From June through September 2003 the ACP Foundation conducted literature research, conferences, telephone surveys and focus groups with physicians and patients regarding health communication. The intent of this work was to identify the most pressing issues in health care communication breakdowns and barriers. These issues were then examined by the Foundation's Programs Committee to asses which issues could be effectively and feasibly addressed by the Foundation's Health Communication Initiative.

The evidence gathered during this information-seeking process clearly supports work in the area of patient health literacy programs. In late 2003, the ACP Foundation Board of Trustees approved a Patient Literacy Program Focus Policy. This policy was designed to direct the Foundation's programmatic work to projects addressing the issues created by an overwhelmingly poor level of health literacy among the American health care consumers and the lack of programs that address this issue from the patient perspective.

Health Literacy Resources and Links