Search PubMed⌕ Search
Home/Archive/PubMed

PubMed · 10181321

Literacy: a problem that managers must handle.

K Brownson
View original source ↗Export metadata ↓

Abstract

Patient and employee illiteracy is a problem that health care managers must deal with. More than half of all Americans may be unable to read and understand written materials used in hospitals, clinics, and other health care facilities. There is a mismatch between employees' and patients' reading level and the reading level of most written materials used by health care facilities. This can lead to noncompliance with treatment, missed appointments, wrong dosage of medications, uninformed consent, and undo fear among patients. Employees who are unable to read directions or policies and procedures are not able to do their jobs efficiently. There are things that managers can do to make written materials more user-friendly.

Explore related subjects

CommunicationEducational StatusHumansInservice TrainingPatient CompliancePatient Education as TopicProfessional-Patient RelationsReadingTeaching MaterialsUnited StatesJournal Article

Keep this discovery

Explore connections, maps & timelines

BibTeXRIS

K Brownson. 1998. Literacy: a problem that managers must handle.. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10181321/

Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.

KEEP EXPLORING

Related citations

PubMed2007

Information-sharing among couples considering multifetal pregnancy reduction.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the information-sharing strategies of couples considering fetal reduction, and the impact of these strategies on the chances of encountering hostility in their social networks. DESIGN: Cross-sectional design of semistructured qualitative interviews, coded with respect to sharing strategies and level of personally directed hostility encountered. SETTING: Multiple Pregnancy Management Program, Comprehensive Genetics, New York, New York. PATIENT(S) AND INTERVENTION(S): Fifty women and their partners who were making a first visit to our maternal-fetal management facility, in order to consider the possibility of multifetal reduction as a pregnancy-management strategy. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Development of information-sharing strategies, and the chances of encountering personally directed hostility regarding multifetal reduction associated with more and less selective strategies. RESULT(S): Four information-sharing strategies emerged from the analysis. Two of these strategies were relatively open (extended network, and both parents). Two other strategies were relatively selective (qualified family and friends, and defended relationship). The selective strategies were significantly less likely to encounter to encounter personally directed hostility (odds ratio, 3.88; 95% confidence intervals, 0.87-17.30). CONCLUSION(S): Selective sharing of information for couples considering multifetal prgnancy reduction is a potentially useful strategy for moderating potentially stressful relationships in their social networks. Clinics should find a way of integrating the discussion of selective sharing into their clinic's cultural repertoire of patient-support services.

Communication↗