Category: We Heart Health Literacy

As you know, dear readers, we’re full of nerd love for stuff like public health books, board games, and (duh) Hamilton. But what do we ❤ the most? Health materials designed with the target audience in mind, of course. They make us weak in the knees, put stars in our eyes… and apparently even inspire us to use clichés.

That’s why we were thrilled that the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) wanted to team up to create user-centered educational handouts about tuberculosis (TB) infection — and why we want to share those materials with you.

TB infection (technically known as latent TB infection or LTBI) is a critical health problem that’s often misunderstood. If it’s not treated, TB infection can turn into TB disease, which can be serious — and even deadly. So it’s super important that people at higher risk for TB infection (like refugees and immigrants) get tested for it and, if they’re diagnosed, take medicine to treat it.

Enter MDPH. Their materials take on the challenge of communicating clearly about TB infection while showcasing health literacy best practices. Here are some key takeaways from these stellar materials.

Focus on simple key messages. For example:

• You can have a type of TB and still feel healthy. This is called TB infection.
• It’s important to take medicine for TB infection.

Use pictures and icons. Refugees and immigrants with limited English proficiency may struggle to understand text-heavy English-language materials. The MDPH handouts include illustrations that convey key messages about TB infection.

Give people tailored information. Patients who decide to get treatment for TB infection have to follow a specific treatment and medical care process. That’s why MDPH created:

• A user-friendly TB infection treatment guide that patients can fill in with their doctors
• An information sheet that helps patients choose strategies to remember to take their TB medicine

Leverage research. The MDPH materials reflect target audiences’ input collected through focus groups and message and icon testing.

Address language needs. MDPH translated all messages into 17 different languages. And because refugees and immigrants with limited English proficiency reported a desire to learn English, MDPH created bilingual materials for each language.

The bottom line: Check out the MDPH TB infection educational handouts to see health literacy best practices in action!

We’ve talked before about how measurements are confusing — often, just giving your readers an estimate is enough. But when it comes to measuring medicine, precision is key. So it’s too bad that current packaging and dosing tools, especially for medicines meant for children, aren’t always up to the task of clear communication.

Take a teaspoon, for example. People who bake know that’s a specific unit of measurement, but to plenty of other folks it’s just the smaller spoon in their silverware drawer. And if the medicine cup in the package is marked with both teaspoons and milliliters? Well, that’s a recipe for confusion.

Wouldn’t it be better if — instead of figuring out exactly which teaspoon or cup to use for your child’s medicine — you had a tool that was clearly marked, easy to use, and made specifically for giving liquid medicine to children?

Last year, a study published in Pediatrics concluded that parents are more likely to give the correct dose of liquid medicine with an oral syringe. The authors of the study make a compelling argument for a “comprehensive pediatric labeling and dosing strategy to reduce medication errors.” Hear, hear!

But until that happens, dear readers, we suggest sharing the following when communicating about giving medicine to kids:

• Use the cup, syringe, spoon, or dropper that comes with the medicine. Don’t use a regular kitchen spoon.
• Ask the pharmacist for an oral syringe to use instead of a cup or spoon.
• If you’re using a measuring cup, mark your child’s dose on the cup with a permanent marker.
• Follow these other safe dosing tips from the FDA.

The bottom line: Communicating about giving medicines to kids? Help prevent mistakes by describing the best tools for the job.

In the last installment of our social media series, we shared tips to make your content stand out on Twitter. Today, we’re going to talk about the most popular social media platform in the United States — the one most of us are aimlessly scrolling through while on the subway, in the waiting room at the dentist, or even in bed before drifting off to sleep.

That’s right. We’re going to talk about Facebook.

Want to hear something wild? In the United States, 68% of all adults use Facebook — which works out to 8 in 10 internet users. And 76% of people on Facebook use it every single day.

What’s so neat about Facebook? Why is everyone and their mother (no, really — moms ❤︎ Facebook) using it? And how can you use it to effectively communicate about health? Have a seat, dear readers, while we share our take on why Facebook has become so universal.

This most prominent of social media platforms can help you:

• Connect with people — lots of them. With so many daily active users, Facebook lets you access a wide network of people (more than any other social media platform). This helps you get your messages out to the masses.
• Say more. With no character limit, Facebook gives you some breathing room to make sure your content is easy to understand.
• Cozy up with your audience. Facebook lets you engage directly with your audience. With comments, replies, and reactions, it’s never been easier for your audience to interact with your content — and for you to respond accordingly. Who doesn’t ❤︎ a little 2-way engagement?
• Be trendy. Facebook keeps track of the topics that people are talking about so you can get in on the hot-button conversations.
• Easily share visual content. It’s no secret that visuals help users understand and remember your content. And they keep users engaged, too! Whether you’re sharing an infographic or shooting a live interview from your phone, it’s easy to upload, view, and share visual content on Facebook.

There you have it, dear readers. With such perks, it’s no wonder why everyone is on the ’book!

The bottom line: Facebook is a great way to share content with the masses and have engaging conversations with your audience.

In health writing, we often have a lot to say. That makes sense — because as you’re well aware, dear readers, health information is complicated! But when you try to fit too much into a single sentence, you can end up with looooooong sentences that are hard to follow.

Consider this sentence:

On weekdays, appointments are offered from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at our health clinic at 8457 Main Street in Springfield, MO for minor injuries, vaccinations (shots), and prescription refills; there is no need to make an appointment in advance.

Did you get all of that? Exactly. And your readers — especially those who struggle with working memory — will probably have a hard time with it, too.

But don’t despair! Here are some of our go-to strategies for keeping lengthy sentences in check:

• Break up sentences so they’re 2 lines or less (pro tip: look out for sentences with a lot of punctuation or prepositional phrases)
• Turn passive voice into active voice (with a little help from zombies)
• Ditch the semicolons

We used those strategies to rehab our ailing example sentence:

Our health clinic offers walk-in appointments for minor injuries, vaccinations (shots), and prescription refills. We’re open on weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at 8457 Main Street, Springfield, MO.

Much better, right? As we were revising, we also made sure to put context first — covering the basics (that the clinic offers walk-in appointments) before moving on to the details about hours of operation and street address.

Want to go one step further? Think about whether you can ditch the sentence format entirely. Does your content lend itself to a bulleted list or step-by-step instructions? For example:

Springfield Walk-In Clinic

• Services: Vaccinations (shots), prescription refills, and treatment for minor injuries
• Location: 8457 Main Street, Springfield, MO
• Hours: Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The bottom line: Having a lot to say is no excuse for never-ending sentences. Do your readers a favor and break them up!

If there’s one thing that public health professionals talk (and write and meet and tweet) about constantly, it’s healthy eating. This is a high-stakes issue, and it’s complicated — which means that figuring out ways to help folks make healthier food choices can be tricky. Also, as you surely know, access to healthy foods is a major piece of the puzzle.

When families who want to eat healthy foods may have trouble getting them, the messaging becomes extra important. But never fear, dear readers, we’ve got tips to help you create compassionate, empowering messages about healthy eating for communities that might be affected by limited food access.

• Keep things positive. It’s easy to get lost in the land of negative framing when communicating about food access issues. Just take the common public health term for communities where it’s hard to find healthy foods: “food deserts.” Hello, negativity. We prefer to talk about “food access and security” because we want to help families and communities focus on what they can do to eat healthier, not leave them thinking about what they don’t have.
• Be honest. Know your audience. If transportation is an issue for your community, acknowledge that. If fresh veggies are hard to find, help folks feel understood — like they’re not alone in dealing with this problem. Talking about the reality of food access issues can help build trust and increase your credibility with readers, making it more likely that they’ll read and act on your recommendations.
• Offer realistic suggestions. When writing about healthy food options, make sure to include tips that are accessible and affordable for your audience. We ❤︎ these MyPlate tips for families on a budget — check it out to get ideas for healthy suggestions that won’t break the bank (like buying frozen veggies and fruits instead of fresh). And if you’re including a healthy recipe, make sure the ingredients are things your audience can find.

The bottom line: When writing about healthy eating, acknowledge food access issues when you need to — and keep your messages positive and realistic.

So, you’ve chosen the platform you’re going to use to build your own website, you’ve written some content, and you’re ready to put it all together. How can you help people navigate around your oh-so-engaging and informative webpages?

Never fear, dear readers! We’ve got some tried-and-true tips for you.

First, think about where your content will go and how you’ll organize it. Pro tip: card sorting is a great way to do this.

Next, pay attention to how a URL will look before adding content to a new page. Most website platforms let you control how the link appears. Instead of a gibberish-y collection of numbers and characters, it’s better to have “pretty permalinks” that contain actual words from the title of a webpage. URLs like these are easier to find and share.

It’s also important to design your website so users will know where they are on every page. This is especially helpful when users land somewhere on your site through a search engine (instead of starting on the homepage). You can do this by:

• Adding breadcrumbs (a descending list near the top of the page that shows where a given page is in the overall site structure)
• Designing an active state for navigation menus (for example, highlighting the current page title in the menu)

Finally, once you have well-organized webpages with clear content, link them to each other! Help your readers learn more by adding links to related pages. Keep in mind that this isn’t a substitute for good navigation — but it’s a helpful practice that will encourage readers to dig deeper into your site.

The bottom line: No webpage is an island — so give your users a clear map and multiple ways to get around.

Here at We ❤︎ Health Literacy Headquarters, we’re just crazy about focus groups. One of our favorite things about focus groups is that they’re super versatile — you can use them throughout the entire product development process. We really ❤︎ that.

But let’s back up a minute to cover the basics.

In a focus group, you get a group of participants together to answer questions and talk about a particular topic. Focus groups can provide valuable insight into participants’ knowledge, attitudes, behaviors, beliefs, and information needs. And the group setting is key because each participant’s comments can stimulate and influence others in the group to think and share more. The result? A dynamic, insightful conversation that can give you a lot of information.

In the early stages of a project (sometimes called the discovery or formative research phase), focus groups let you get to know your audience. Say you’re developing an app for kids with diabetes. You could recruit actual kids with diabetes and ask them questions that get at their beliefs about healthy eating, challenges or frustrations they’re having managing the condition, or how the app would work in their dream world. You could then use the insights gained from the focus groups to shape your product’s technical requirements, design direction, and communication strategy.

(Pro tip: consider souping up your formative focus group with a collaging activity.)

Once you’ve started creating your product, you can use focus groups to explore how well it fits what your audience wants and needs. At this point, you would show participants some components of what you’re working on (like sample messages, design sketches, or a draft material or prototype) and get their reactions. Then you would use this feedback to refine your product to better meet your audience’s needs.

What’s not to ❤︎?

The bottom line: Use focus groups throughout the development process to help you create a product that’s right for your audience.

This week, we’re thrilled to add to our frequently asked question series by answering a great question that came from one of our regular readers: What do you think of the term “layperson”? (The context here, in case you’re wondering, is the difference between a health care professional and a consumer.)

You may not be too surprised, dear readers, to find out we’re just not that into “layperson.” First, it’s a weird word. There’s nothing intuitive about it — and it’s not used all that often anymore. It also hits a vaguely religious note, which usually isn’t necessary when it comes to health information.

Finally, the word epitomizes the relationship that we try not to establish between health information communicator and health information consumer — that is, we (health communicators) are the in-the-field experts and you (consumers) are the outsider non-experts. That is something we do not ❤︎ at all — and it flies in the face of some of our core plain language principles, like writing in familiar language and avoiding condescending language.

Those are our thoughts on the term itself — but our inquisitive reader, perhaps anticipating our feelings about “layperson,” also asked if we could suggest some alternatives. And in another perhaps not-so-shocking turn of events, we’d say that answer comes down to knowing your audience.

The tips we offer from We ❤︎ Health Literacy Headquarters mostly apply to content for consumers. So our approach is generally not to label the consumer audience with anything beyond the second-person “you” — for example, “Treatment for Diabetes: What You Need to Know,” not “Treatment for Diabetes: What Consumers (ew)/Laypeople (ick!) Need to Know.” We’d be more likely to call out a resource that’s not meant for consumers — like if we created one for professionals: “Treating Diabetes: Information for Professionals.”

From our perspective, then, it’s generally not necessary to call laypeople “laypeople” at all — or “consumers” or “the public” or whatever other term you can come up with to distinguish consumers from non-consumers. But if you write mainly for a professional audience and you do want to distinguish the consumer audience, “patient” is probably a safe bet overall. You may also be able to specify within a consumer audience depending on the topic (like “pregnant women”).

Either way, we empower you to skip “layperson.”

The bottom line: Forget about the term “layperson” in your health communication materials. (And if you already have, pretend we didn’t remind you!)

Sometimes, in internet-land, users go to a website with the express goal of just poking around — you know, e-wandering until they find something they’re interested in (or until they don’t and move on). But when it comes to health content, people are usually looking for something specific — like information about a recent diagnosis.

And that, dear readers, is when a well-designed search function can make all the difference.

So, when you’re building a website (or improving an existing site), how can you make sure the search function will improve the user experience? Here are a few best practices that can help.

• Make the search bar prominent. Putting it at the top right of the page is still best, since that’s where users expect to find it. But the days of teeny-tiny search bars hidden in the corner are over. Make sure the search bar is big enough to spot easily — and keep it free of visual clutter.
• Help people out. We ❤︎ autocomplete! Set up the search function to provide spelling suggestions or display common search terms once a user starts typing. This can be especially useful for health content, since some of those medical terms can be hard to remember — and tricky to spell.
• Keep it relevant. A search bar is only helpful if the search results are relevant. This is where “best bets” come in. Best bets allow you to pair specific search terms with key resources. In other words, they let you set which resources display first in the search results.
• Test, test, and test some more! No one knows what your site needs better than your target audience. Getting feedback on your search function is key to understanding which features are the most (and least) desirable to your users.

The bottom line: An effective search function can go a long way toward making your health website easy to use.