A MedlinePlus® Kiosk Promoting Health Literacy

Abstract

As an ongoing community outreach project, a pictorial touch-screen kiosk and Web site was developed for 48 MedlinePlus® tutorials. This learning experience serves Davidson County, Tennessee's uninsured patients at the University of Tennessee/Baptist Hospital's Internal Medicine Clinic. The availability of a health information kiosk at the University of Tennessee/Baptist Hospital primary care clinic significantly increases health literacy for patients by providing reliable, physician-recommended information in an appropriate format—information these patients did not previously find readily available. Participants report they have a greater understanding of their health issues, and the project is introducing hundreds of patients to MedlinePlus.

KEYWORDS:

• Community health centers
• computer literacy
• consumer health information
• educational technology
• health literacy
• health promotion
• MedlinePlus®

This project was funded in whole or in part with federal funds from the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under contract No. NO1-LM-6-3502 with the University of Maryland at Baltimore Health Sciences and Human Services Library.