Health Literacy and Cardiovascular Disease: Fundamental Relevance to Primary and Secondary Prevention: A Scientific Statement From the American Heart Association

Abstract

Health literacy is the degree to which individuals are able to access and process basic health information and services and thereby participate in health-related decisions. Limited health literacy is highly prevalent in the United States and is strongly associated with patient morbidity, mortality, healthcare use, and costs. The objectives of this American Heart Association scientific statement are (1) to summarize the relevance of health literacy to cardiovascular health; (2) to present the adverse associations of health literacy with cardiovascular risk factors, conditions, and treatments; (3) to suggest strategies that address barriers imposed by limited health literacy on the management and prevention of cardiovascular disease; (4) to demonstrate the contributions of health literacy to health disparities, given its association with social determinants of health; and (5) to propose future directions for how health literacy can be integrated into the American Heart Association's mandate to advance cardiovascular treatment and research, thereby improving patient care and public health. Inadequate health literacy is a barrier to the American Heart Association meeting its 2020 Impact Goals, and this statement articulates the rationale to anticipate and address the adverse cardiovascular effects associated with health literacy.

Individual preferences on the balancing of good and harm of cardiovascular disease screening

“…In addition, if current smokers are the main target group, a high-tech hospital with CT scan holds the highest value. Similarly with regards to lower health literacy, which in increasingly recognised as an aspect that require specific attention,29 our results identify location as important dimensions for choice.…”

Determinants of health-related quality of life: a cross-sectional investigation in physician-managed anticoagulated patients using vitamin K antagonists

“…Among these, health literacy showed interesting effects in determining adequate PCS12 and MCS12. Broadly, promoting adequate levels of health literacy is a public health goal for ensuring equity of care, reduction of health costs, and better achievement of outcomes [24,43], acknowledging that health literacy is a key indicator for evaluating the quality of care delivery [44,45].…”

Health Literacy and Self-Rated Health among Homeless Adults

“…Health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand health information and services, and apply that acquired information in health decision-making (Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Health Literacy, 2004; Magnani et al, 2018). One of the approaches to measuring health literacy is based on an individual's selfrating of difficulty with understanding or reading medical or health information (Chew et al, 2008).…”

“…Health literacy is considered a vital asset to the maintenance and promotion of good health. Hence, poor or limited health literacy can pose a barrier to disease prevention, access to health information, utilization of health care services (e.g., cancer screenings), and medication use (Magnani et al, 2018;Peterson et al, 2011). It is, therefore, not surprising that poor health literacy has been associated with limited knowledge of medications and health conditions, higher likelihood of morbidity and mortality, hospitalization, health expenditures, and poor health outcomes (Magnani et al, 2018;Peterson et al, 2011).…”