National Health Literacy Month is celebrated in October to recognize the importance of health literacy and how it can improve health. The month highlights the ability to find, understand, and use health information to make informed decisions. Health literacy is a central focus of Healthy People 2030.
One of the initiative’s overarching goals demonstrates this focus: Eliminate health disparities, achieve health equity and attain health literacy to improve the health and well-being of all. Healthy People 2030 addresses both personal health literacy and organizational health literacy and provides the following updated definitions:
Personal health literacy is 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.
This aligns with the concept that people’s health literacy can be assessed at a given point in time. This is important as we conduct population studies and research on interventions aimed at ensuring equal access to information and services for people with limited literacy skills. This new definition may also prompt new ways of studying and promoting personal health literacy. In addition, it encourages efforts to address the skills that help people move from understanding to action and from a focus on their own health to a focus on the health of their communities.
Organizational health literacy is the degree to which organizations equitably enable individuals to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.
By adopting a definition for organizational health literacy, Healthy People acknowledges that personal health literacy is contextual and that producers of health information and services have a role in improving health literacy. The definition also emphasizes organizations’ responsibility to equitably address health literacy, in line with Healthy People 2030’s overarching goals.
Six Healthy People 2030 Objectives Related to Health Literacy:
- Increase the proportion of adults whose health care provider checked their understanding
- Decrease the proportion of adults who report poor communication with their health care provider
- Increase the proportion of adults whose health care providers involved them in decisions as much as they wanted
- Increase the proportion of people who say their online medical record is easy to understand
- Increase the proportion of adults with limited English proficiency who say their providers explain things clearly
- Increase the health literacy of the population
Let’s commit to recognizing the importance of making health information easy to understand and the health care system easier to navigate – there are many tools available to offer guidance. We all have a responsibility to do better. Let’s work together to move health literacy awareness to health literacy action! #HealthLiteracyMonth
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Health Literacy: Improving health literacy is one way to advance health equity. Understand what health literacy is, who it affects and strategies that can be done to improve health literacy.