Illawarra Institute for Mental Health, School of Psychology, University of Wollongong, Australia.
Illawarra Institute for Mental Health, School of Psychology, University of Wollongong, Australia.
J Subst Abuse Treat. 2019 Jan;96:46-52. doi: 10.1016/j.jsat.2018.10.009. Epub 2018 Oct 23.
Health literacy refers to the degree to which people can access and understand health information, as well as communicate their health needs to service providers. Whilst health literacy is increasingly being examined within general community samples, there is limited research focused on substance use disorders where the need for health literacy is likely to be high. The aim of this study was to examine the health literacy profiles of people attending substance use disorder treatment and to examine how these profiles were related to measures of quality of life, mental health, and physical health.
Participants were attending specialist non-government substance use disorder treatment across New South Wales, Queensland, and the Australia Capital Territory, Australia (N = 298). Participants completed the Health Literacy Questionnaire, a multi-dimensional measure of health literacy. Latent profile analysis was conducted to identify profiles of health literacy within the sample.
Three distinct health literacy profiles were identified, and termed low (24.2%), moderate (62.8%) and high health literacy (13.1%). Participants with lower levels of health literacy had lower levels of social support in their home environment outside of treatment, as well as lower levels of quality of life, higher levels of psychological distress, and poorer mental health. There was no difference between the three profiles on measures of physical health.
The current study found that low to moderate health literacy levels were common for those attending residential substance abuse treatment. Participants with lower health literacy tended to have poorer quality of life and mental health. Future research should examine strategies to improve health literacy amongst people attending alcohol and other drug treatment. It may also be useful for service providers to consider ways to minimise the impact of low health literacy on the health needs and outcomes of this vulnerable population.
健康素养是指人们获取和理解健康信息的程度，以及向服务提供者表达自身健康需求的能力。尽管健康素养在一般社区样本中越来越受到关注，但针对物质使用障碍的研究相对较少，而物质使用障碍人群对健康素养的需求可能较高。本研究旨在考察接受物质使用障碍治疗人群的健康素养特征，并探讨这些特征与生活质量、心理健康和身体健康测量指标之间的关系。
参与者来自澳大利亚新南威尔士州、昆士兰州和澳大利亚首都领地的专门非政府物质使用障碍治疗机构（N=298）。参与者完成了健康素养问卷，这是一种多维健康素养测量工具。采用潜在剖面分析来确定样本中的健康素养特征。
确定了三种不同的健康素养特征，并将其分别命名为低健康素养（24.2%）、中健康素养（62.8%）和高健康素养（13.1%）。健康素养水平较低的参与者在治疗环境之外的家庭环境中获得的社会支持较少，生活质量较低，心理困扰程度较高，心理健康状况较差。在身体健康测量指标方面，三种特征之间没有差异。
本研究发现，接受住院物质滥用治疗的患者健康素养水平普遍较低，处于中低水平。健康素养较低的参与者往往生活质量和心理健康状况较差。未来的研究应探讨提高参加酒精和其他药物治疗人群健康素养的策略。对于服务提供者来说，考虑一些方法来最小化低健康素养对这一弱势群体的健康需求和结果的影响，可能也会有所帮助。
