Making a Case for "Education for Health Literacy": An International Perspective.

In many countries, health literacy research, practice, and policy have been moving away from a focus only on medical care and health-care settings to a much broader conceptualization. In this broader perspective, health literacy can be obtained and used across many other settings (e.g.

Health literacy in chronic disease management: a matter of interaction.

Health literacy plays a crucial role in chronic disease management. To comprehensively manage chronic conditions on a daily basis, individuals must be able to assess, understand, evaluate, and use health information. Several key publications emphasize that health literacy is not merely a matter of individual skills but that it is highly dependent on the accessibility of health-care systems, the communication skills of health-care professionals, and the level of complexity of the health information.

Health literacy and chronic disease management: drawing from expert knowledge to set an agenda.

Understanding the nature and impact of health literacy is a priority in health promotion and chronic disease prevention and treatment. Health literacy comprises the application of a broad set of skills to access, comprehend, evaluate, communicate and act on health information for improved health and well-being. A complex concept, it involves multiple participants and is enacted across a wide variety of contexts.

Effectiveness of educational interventions on asthma self-management in Punjabi and Chinese asthma patients: a randomized controlled trial.

Background: Asthma tends to be less well controlled among ethnic minority groups, and its prevalence in new immigrants increases significantly the longer they are in Canada; mainly due to their lack of familiarity with English and difficulty understanding information regarding the disease, health literacy, cultural issues, housing conditions, and lack of access to appropriate care services.

Objective: To explore the effectiveness of different formats of culturally relevant information and its impact on asthma patients' self-management within the Punjabi, Mandarin, and Cantonese communities.

Methods: Using a participatory approach, we developed and tested knowledge and community educational videos (with similar information, but used a different approach, i.