Welcome to the Culture and Health Literacy
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What is health literacy? Why is it important?
Health literacy is often defined as the ability to understand and act on medical or therapeutic instructions. Health literacy is increasingly recognized as an important factor in patient compliance with physician recommendations, for example concerning cancer screenings, or medication, and it has also played a role in chronic disease outcomes. In the past, health literacy has often been narrowly defined and has neglected cultural factors that shape health literacy in low-income, ethnic minority and immigrant populations. Click here to learn more about this "traditional" definition of health literacy.

This study is critical to the growing literature on health literacy because much of the existing research narrowly focuses on cognition and a patient’s ability to read and comprehend instructions, while previous research conducted by Dr. Shaw and her colleagues indicates that cultural background plays an important and under-emphasized role in a patient’s willingness or ability to follow their physician’s instructions, including obtaining recommended cancer screenings. Click here to learn more about this more cultural conception of health literacy, including a link to a PDF of Dr. Shaw's 2005 Medical Anthropology Quarterly article on this topic.

Project Description
Too often, people with the greatest health burdens have limited access to health information and limited ability to process that information. Funded by the National Cancer Institute, this four-year, mixed-method study aims to broaden our understanding of health literacy by exploring the often-neglected cultural factors that shape health literacy in low-income, ethnic minority and immigrant populations. The study is based in Springfield, Massachusetts at the Caring Health Center. Located in a federally-designated refugee resettlement area, Caring Health Center is a federally-funded Section 330 primary care clinic that serves predominantly low income and minority patients. The health center serves a patient population that is 34% African-American, 37% Hispanic, 15% Russian immigrant and 10% Vietnamese immigrants. Over 50% of CHC’s adult patients require translation services.

Over the course of the study, clinic patients from four ethnic groups who have a medical diagnosis of diabetes or hypertension will be interviewed using an epidemiological survey while qualitative data will be collected through in-depth interviewing, home visits, and chronic disease diaries. While much research has been done on patient literacy and readability, less work has been done that places health literacy in the broader context of socioeconomic and cultural differences between patients and providers that hinder communication and compliance. The project is a follow-up to a related pilot study, Evaluating Culturally Appropriate Health Care (R03 HS014086-01) conducted at Caring Health Center from 2003-2005, while Dr. Shaw was a researcher at the Hispanic Health Council.

In The News!
Click here and skip to 10:37 to listen to the Culture and Health Literacy Project's and Caring Health Center's own Cristina Huebner discuss culture and healthcare in regards to refugees and immigrants in an interview with Tina Antolini on WFCR.

More About "Traditional" Health Literacy

More About A Cultural Conception of Health Literacy

Research Design & Methods

Papers and Presentations

Culture and Health Web Links

The Fine Print

• Grant title: The Impact of Cultural Differences on Health Literacy and Chronic Disease Outcomes
• Funded by: National Cancer Institute
• Project period: September 27, 2006 – July 31, 2010