Increasing the Health Literacy among Patients - Essay Example

"Increasing the Health Literacy among Patients" is a decent example of a paper on care.
The truism in health care services ascertains that if an individual is unable to understand any information regarding his or her health, he or she is likely to suffer from poorer health. Approximately nine out of every 10 Americans have difficulties understanding health information (Kelly 45). Bear in mind that, health literacy does not necessarily mean reading the data provided in medical prescriptions. Nurses have a great role in ensuring that their patients have better knowledge about the medicine that they prescribe to them. In other words, nurses play a huge role in increasing the health literacy of a patient (Bastable 51). This paper will seek to develop strategies in which nurses can help increase the health literacy of their patients.

The first strategy that nurses can develop in order to increase the health literacy of their patients involves reinforcing the reasons as to why time is very essential in taking medicine. Nurses should emphasize to their patients that taking the correct medicine at the right time is very substantial as it coincides with the directions of the doctor (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 18). Ensuring that patients follow the information about the time one should take medication enables the patient to recover quickly which in turn reduces things like premature death and wastage of time through sickness. Health care is a very complex phenomenon whereas the health care system can happen to be very confusing. Limited health literacy can be very troubling to any patient. Thus, nurses can strategize the aspect of helping their patients acquire the relevant health knowledge required to help a diabetic patient manage his or her condition just as required (Kelly 57).

Additionally, a nurse can help patients become health literate by suggesting to them the relevant internet sources, patient portals, websites, and blogs that offer subsistent information regarding ways in which a patient can keep up with the instructions of a doctor or details from prescribed medicine. Generally, a nurse has a responsibility to infiltrate or rather instill health care knowledge on the livelihood of a patient in order to ensure continued survival for all (Bastable 60). Nurses can also improve the health literacy of patients by helping them be aware of the several ways to get access to adequate and reliable information regarding their health. Further, nurses can improvise their patients’ health knowledge by warning them about the available information on websites that may consist of inaccurate and misleading information. With the increasing availability of health care information all over the internet, it is of great importance for nurses to take that opportunity and educate their patients on the dangers of applying information that could be misleading (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 25).

In conclusion, nurses can also employ internet resources including but not limited to Walden Library and AMA blog, and help improvise their patients’ health literacy. Other preferable resources that can help patients towards the improvement of their healthcare literacy compose of AHRQ Podcast, which substantiates health ignorance with health literacy (Kelly 66). The U.S Department of Human and Health Services is yet another great health care information source that nurses could apply in their quest to help their patients attain literacy in their health care. If I were to help improve the health literacy of any individual, I would ask patients to have a pill card with them at all times (Bastable 80). This is important as it helps a patient put down a systemic way of keeping track of medication.