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To function well in the 21st century a person must possess a wide range of abilities and competencies,in essence many ‘literacies’. These ‘literacies’—from being able to read a newspaper to understandinginformation provided by a health care provider—are multiple, dynamic, and malleable.‘Health literacy’ is an emerging concept that involves the bringing together of people from both thehealth and literacy fields. Health literacy builds on the idea that both health and literacy are criticalresources for everyday living. Our level of literacy directly affects our ability to not only act on healthinformation but also to take more control of our health as individuals, families and communities.While many definitions for health literacy exist, the definition that has been adopted in this paper is, -The degree to which people are able to access, understand, appraise and communicate information toengage with the demands of different health contexts in order to promote and maintain good healthacross the life-course.The scope of health literacy has three distinct ‘levels’:• Functional literacy: Skills that allow an individual to read consent forms, medicinelabels, and health care information and to understand written and oral information givenby physicians, nurses, pharmacists, or other health care professionals and to act ondirections by taking medication correctly, adhering to self-care at home, and keepingappointment schedules.
• Conceptual literacy: The wide range of skills, and competencies that people develop
over their lifetimes to seek out, comprehend, evaluate, and use health information and
concepts to make informed choices, reduce health risks, and increase quality of life.
• Health literacy as empowerment: Strengthening active citizenship for health by
bringing together a commitment to citizenship with health promotion and prevention
efforts and involving individuals in: understanding their rights as patients and their ability
to navigate through the health care system; acting as an informed consumers about the
health risks of products and services and about options in health care providers, and acting
individually or collectively to improve health through the political system through voting,
advocacy or membership of social movements.
Why is health literacy an important area to consider when planning health promotion initiatives? The
published literature identifies six general themes that help determine why health literacy is important
for population health:
1. The large numbers of people affected: some countries within the EMR have high
adult literacy rates, however, approximately half have rates below the global
developing country average of 79 percent. In most EMRO countries literacy rates are
lower among women than men - the exceptions being Qatar and the UAE.
2. Poor health outcomes: there is a clear correlation between inadequate health
literacy—as measured by reading fluency—and increased mortality rates.
3. Increasing rates of chronic disease: In the EMR, chronic diseases are estimated to
account for almost half (47%) of the total burden of disease. Health literacy plays a
crucial role in chronic disease self-management.
4. Health care costs: the additional costs of limited health literacy range from 3 to 5% of
the total health care cost per year
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