Improving health literacy – bridging the gap between newcomer populations and quality health care

Abstract

Health literacy is the ability to obtain and utilize health information in order to advocate for one’s health. It is paramount to a recent immigrant’s successful integration into the Canadian healthcare system and their maintenance of health in the long term. Despite its importance, 60% of native-born Canadians and an even higher proportion of immigrants indicate that they are not health literate. In this article, we focus on the importance of health literacy in an immigrant population and current barriers they may face in accessing health care. We discuss current shortcomings within the healthcare system in terms of improving health literacy for newcomers and explore strategies currently used in the United States and Canada. Based on our review of the literature, it is clear that promoting health literacy is a multi-dimensional challenge which requires the synthesis of many strategies, including clear written and oral communication, use of multimedia tools, cultural sensitivity, participatory teaching, community resources, and availability of diverse care providers who can relate to newcomers linguistically and culturally.