Free Instructions: How to write clear patient education materials

You’ve head about the importance of health literacy. You know many of your patients have difficulty following written instructions. You know you should be writing your patient education materials more clearly. But you just don’t know where to begin.

Plain language is important for clear communications. There are many PDF booklets and books offering you step-by-step instructions on how to edit your materials for clarity. Best of all, they are free to download from the Internet. Here are links to a few:

America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP). (2010). Health Literacy: A Toolkit for Communicators Retrieved from http://www.ahip.org/healthliteracy/toolkit

Centers for medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). (2010). Toolkit for Making Written Material Clear and Effective. Retrieved from https://www.cms.gov/WrittenMaterialsToolkit/.

Children’s Hospital & Regional Medical Center. (2005). Family Education Materials Development Kit Retrieved 3/4, 2006, from www.seattlechildrens.org/pdf/PEMatDevKit.pdf

Covering Kids & Families National Program Office. (2005). The Health Literacy Style Manual, from http://www.coveringkidsandfamilies.org/resources/docs/stylemanual.pdf

Doak, C. C., Doak, L. G., & Root, J. H. (1996). Teaching patients with low literacy skills (2nd ed.). Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company. Retrieved from http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/healthliteracy/resources/doak-book/

Ridpath, J. R., Greene, S. M., & Wiese, C. J. (2007). PRISM Readability Toolkit Retrieved from http://www.grouphealthresearch.org/capabilities/readability/ghchs_readability_toolkit.pdf

Weiss, B. D. (2003). Health Literacy: A manual for clinicians Retrieved from http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/367/healthlitclinicians.pdf

So stop wasting resources by giving your patients printed information they cannot understand. Apply evidence to practice, edit your patient education materials to optimize readability, and observe the differences in health outcomes.

Happy teaching!