PATIENTS USE OF HEALTH-TEACHING MATERIALS AT 3 READABILITY LEVELS

The extent to which patients use and learn from drug literature writte n at three different readability levels was examined. A two-way analys is of variance showed an interaction effect on knowledge score between the readability level of the leaflet and the amount of schooling subj ects reported: persons with higher education learned most from the har dest pamphlet and persons with the least formal education learned the most from the easiest pamphlet. A similar interaction was found in tes ting the likelihood that patients had read the leaflet. The results su ggest that persons with little formal education would benefit from tea ching materials with a readability level considerably lower than even many ''easy-to-read'' health-teaching materials available today. Copyr ight (C) 1997 by W.B. Saunders Company.