Abstract
Purpose
Shared decision making promotes patient participation in medical decisions. This study aims to explore the decision-making situation and influencing factors in patients with cancer.
Patients and methods
A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted for patient with cancers in regional teaching hospitals in northern Taiwan using short-form Mandarin Health Literacy Scale (s-MHLS) and Shared Decision Making Questionnaire (SDM-Q-9), with total 120 cases collected from January 15 to April 30, 2018.
Results
Overall health literacy in patients with cancer is 86.52%, and degree of shared decision making is 89.63%; higher education level indicated better health literacy (p<0.001); health literacy is significantly correlated with Shared decision making (r=0.258, p=0.004). Increasing education level by one grade elevated health literacy by 0.623. Expanding health knowledge by one source increased health literacy by 0.307 points, one point increase in health literacy enhanced shared decision making by 0.128 points. Using path analysis, we found education level affects health literacy, which in turn influences shared decision making.
Conclusion
Improving health literacy is indispensable to promote patient participation in shared decision making in the highly professional medical field. Education level directly affects health literacy; therefore, in the future, providing disease-matching health education is crucial for patients with lower education levels to enhance their health literacy. Health literacy directly affects shared decision making; therefore, more active assistance in achieving patient health literacy is crucial to implement shared decision making.
Acknowledgments
We appreciate the funding (107-HCH072) from National Taiwan University Hospital Hsinchu Branch, and the statistical consulting assistance provided by the Biotechnology Research and Development Center. We also thank Professor Meixiu Lu, Professor Xuanyi Huang, Professor Shuyuan Liang and Associate Professor Meilan Ke for their guidance and recommendations in the research process. We are even more grateful to all patient with cancers who participated in this study.
Ethics Approval And Consent To Participate
The study was approved by the IRB of National Taiwan University Hospital Hsinchu Branch (106-076-E). This study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.
Disclosure
The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.