Affiliation:
1. USPHS, Commissioned Corp, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid ServicesBaltimore, MD
2. Towson UniversityTowson, MD
Abstract
Health literacy is recognized as one of the major factors related to positive health outcomes and involves understanding, accessing, and using health information to make necessary health decisions. However, many members of multicultural populations demonstrate limited health literacy due to language barriers, health-care providers' limited knowledge of cultural variations, health-care communication restrictions, and low literacy levels as related to educational attainment. These problems become more complex for people with speech, language, and hearing problems and result in higher risk for inadequate health literacy. In this article, we review the status of health literacy and health-care communication of multicultural populations and offer suggestions for speech-language pathologists and audiologists to improve health literacy.
Publisher
American Speech Language Hearing Association
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