logo

Communication Skills in Healthcare Sector

   

Added on  2020-02-24

6 Pages1880 Words53 Views
Nursing Degree1

Overview Health Literacy: Health literacy is the capability to gather information, read,understand and practice information and knowledge to make proper health decisions. Healthliteracy is helpful in simplifying information, circumventing waffle and encouraging patientsto ask question. There are diverse factors affecting health literacy. These factors includehealth education material, clarity of the text, current health status of the patient, languagediscrepancies, culturally acceptable material, formatting and style of material, sentencestructuring, utilization of illustrations and interactions during clinical procedure (Parnell,2014). It is important for a healthcare professional to identify a patient with less health literacy. It isuseful to provide care to patient which is understandable for the patient. It has been provedthat for the patients with low health literacy, there has been improved health outcome, ifprovided care is tailored to their understanding. Health literacy can be provided to thepatients in terms of correct medication use, correct dose and dosage of medication, utilizationof health check-up, performing regular exercise and smoking cessation. Health education canbe provided to the patients with the help of readable brochures and videos. These mediaproved effective in providing health education to the patients. Variety of tests including threeminutes assessments, are useful for the evaluating capability if patient’s health literacy.Healthcare professional should intervene with patient on regular basis to understandinsufficiency of health literacy in patient. Healthcare professional should promote patients toask questions. Patients like elderly, ethnic minorities, recent immigrants, and persons withlow general literacy are at high risk of negative impacts of insufficient health literacy. Hencehealthcare professionals should give more attention towards such patients to reducemedication errors, to reduce frequent rehospitalisation and to reduce duration of stay in thehospital (Osborne, 2011). Along with reading about health and disease, health literacy should also consider cultural andconceptual knowledge. It should also encompass assumptions and language about health anddisease. Communication skills in the healthcare sector should be compatible with languageand culture. Communication in the healthcare sector should aim to reduce disparity in accessof quality healthcare service. Interpreters have significant role in the health literacy and allhuman resources should be used to maximum extent. Cross-cultural work environment has prominent role in providing safe and quality healthcare.Health communication should be interactive process. Health literacy can also be described as2

set of skills, theory of behaviour change and social practice. Calgary Charter on HealthLiteracy stated that health literacy include reading, writing, listening, speaking, numeracy,and critical analysis, as well as communication and interaction skills. Benefits of healthliteracy include informed choices, of health service, lessened health risks, augmentedprevention and wellness, improved navigation of the health system, increased patient safety,improved patient care, lesser inequities in health, and better quality of life (Zarcadoolas et al.,2012). Cultural and conceptual knowledge: Conceptual knowledge of health literacy comprises offundamental literacy, science literacy, civic literacy and cultural literacy. Health literacy is astrategy for empowerment with crucial concepts and frameworks. These include basic orfunctional skills, communicative or interactive skills and critical health literacy. Health staff and health systems have significant impact on the health literacy of patients.Communication and assessment skills of the healthcare professionals have significant impacton the health literacy. This communication should promote shared decision making,information focusing on individual requirements and information which is understandable.Other stakeholders like media, marketplace and government agencies should provideinformation to patients in suitable manner. Health literate organisation status can be achievedby providing health literacy to healthcare workforce and giving priority for partnering withconsumers (Mitic and Rootman, 2012). Health literacy can be defined differently for different stakeholders. Individual can attendhealth literacy applying skills to navigate, understand, analyse, communicate and use healthinformation. Health care workers can be health literate by providing information to improverecognize and act according to the provided information. Health care organisations orsystems can be health literate allocating indiscriminate, safe, easy and quality healthcareservices and health information (Pleasant and McKinney, 2011). Health literacy in the context of language and culture: Health literacy is a integration ofsocial and individual factors. Moreover, it is significantly affected by education, culture andlanguage. There can be inequality in health literacy due to different cultures and diverseeducational backgrounds. Difference in the education, culture and language betweeninformation provider and information user may also lead to problem in health literacy. Hence,health literacy is dynamic process rather than static process. Integration of health literacy andcultural and communication competencies at individual and organisation level can facilitate3

End of preview

Want to access all the pages? Upload your documents or become a member.

Related Documents
Role of Effective Communication in Health Literacy
|3
|711
|58

(PDF) Cultural Meaning in Health Communication
|10
|586
|14

Importance of Effective Communication and Health Literacy in Culturally Safe Healthcare Environment
|7
|706
|434

Effective Communication and Health Literacy in a Culturally Safe Healthcare Environment
|10
|553
|423

Effective Communication and Health Literacy in a Culturally Safe Healthcare Environment
|10
|2555
|304

Life Stages And Influence Of Age In Health Care
|4
|905
|285