Table 4.
Health literacy policy recommendations to improve health literacy in Latin America.
| Adapted from the WHO Health Evidence Network Synthesis Report 57 (5) |
| Integrate lessons learned from barriers and initiatives presented in this review to inform future health literacy policy |
| Orchestrate a holistic approach to improve health literacy policy, including the home environment, workplaces, traditional and social media, communities, and legislative systems |
| Support and prioritize evidence-based health literacy research that addresses policy needs at community and national levels |
| Incorporate evaluation protocol into health literacy initiatives to show the impacts made on health and cost |
| Facilitate successful implementation by involving all sectors, exhibiting astute political leadership, and thoughtfully weaving doctrines of local culture into health literacy policy |
| Additional recommendations |
| General |
| Standardize health literacy definitions |
| Encourage development of health literacy assessment scales in Spanish, Portuguese, and local languages, incorporating local culture |
| Use a multidisciplinary, people-centered approach, focusing on population-level aspects of health literacy (e.g. social cohesion, empowerment) |
| Training |
| Broaden knowledge and responsibility for health literacy to the entire care team, not just physicians and nurses. All health professional education (medical and public health) should address health literacy in the curricula and measurable outcomes of success |
| Include questions on national exams to establish a baseline for health literacy on topics such as healthy eating and exercise habits |
| Private sector |
| Inspire communities, including churches, to conduct/sponsor health literacy programs; health and health literacy could form the basis for study groups at churches as well as messages from church leadership |
| Leverage the private sector to promote organization-wide cultures of well-being to foster health literacy such as a pan-national health literacy organization across Latin America |
| Government |
| Incorporate principles of health literacy, especially as they relate to complex medical terminology or necessary actions, into public health programs (this will also help to combat misinformation) |
| Encourage national, regional, and municipal governments to take a more active role in promoting health literacy and developing policies that will enhance health literacy and healthcare; health promotion departments can advocate for promotion of health literacy |
| Ensure collaboration between a given country’s Ministries of Health and Education to implement an effective health literacy program |