Health Literacy, Social Determinants of Health, and Disease Prevention and Control

Abstract

Health literacy has been defined as the “degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions” (Nielsen-Bohlman et al., 2004). Low health literacy is associated with more hospitalizations, greater use of emergency care, decreased use of preventive services, poorer ability to interpret labels and health messages, poorer health status, higher mortality, and higher health care costs (Berkman et al., 2011). Functional health literacy extends beyond proficiency in reading, writing, and numeracy to include interpretation of images and oral communication (Magnani et al., 2018; Ousseine 2019). Communicative health literacy is essential to abstract skills such as evaluating and weighing treatment considerations and engaging in medical decision-making (Magnani et al., 2018; Ousseine 2019). Low health literacy negatively impacts disease self-management and individual health behaviors such as adherence with weight control and tobacco cessation interventions and cancer screening recommendations (Weiss & Smith-Simone, 2010; Bennett et al., 2009). Individuals with low health literacy are more likely to present with advanced illness, resulting in delayed diagnosis and treatment and poorer outcomes (Aljassim & Ostini, 2020).