Interventions for Improving Population Health Literacy: Insights From a Rapid Review of the Evidence

Abstract

The promotion of health literacy is critical to active and informed participation in health promotion, disease prevention, and health care. This article reports on a rapid review of the evidence concerning effective strategies for improving health literacy. This review was undertaken as part of a series of evidence reviews commissioned by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control through the Translating Health Communications Project. The authors searched a range of electronic databases and identified six evidence reviews published between 2000 and 2011. A narrative synthesis of the findings was then conducted. The majority of the published research originated in the United States, and the studies reviewed mainly focused on functional health literacy interventions that occurred in clinical settings. Considerable gaps in the evidence exist regarding the most effective population-level health literacy interventions, particularly with regard to communicable diseases. There is a paucity of intervention studies conducted on this topic in Europe. Implications of the findings for improving population health literacy on the prevention and control of communicable diseases in Europe are considered.

Acknowledgments

This rapid evidence review was commissioned by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) as one of the outputs of the Framework Partnership Agreement Grant/2009/007, “Establishing a Programme for Dissemination of Evidence-Based Health Communication Activities and Innovations on Communicable Diseases for Country Support in the EU and EEA/EFTA, 2009–12.” The project was overseen by Ülla-Karin Nurm, Piotr Wysocki, Andrea Würz, and Susana Barragan of the Public Health Capacity and Communication Unit at the ECDC. The authors acknowledge the comments of the aforementioned individuals on an earlier report of this review. The views expressed in this paper are solely those of the authors and do not represent the views of the ECDC.

Notes

¹To retrieve the full technical report, “A Rapid Evidence Review of Interventions for Improving Health Literacy” (D'Eath, Barry, & Sixsmith, 2011), visit http://ecdc.europa.eu/en/publications/Publications/1205-TER-Improving-Health-Literacy.pdf.

²Although published in 2011, this review was accessed before completion of the report and was, therefore, included in the write-up.

Table 1. Summary characteristics of reviews

.