Plain language improves patient understanding, accuracy in questionnaires
A communication technology used as part of the intake procedure improved understanding and comprehensibility of low-educated patients in health-related questionnaires, according to a study published April 23 in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.
Health literacy is key in producing accurate information regarding the patient’s health and history, but low-educated patients struggle filling out medical questionnaires. In this study, researchers evaluated the impact of the Dutch Talking Touch Screen Questionnaire (DTTSQ) on meeting the needs of low-educated patients by using plain language on an existing questionnaire.
“Patient-centered care puts a relatively strong emphasis on communication and information and takes the patient’s perspective as a starting point,” wrote first author Marlies Welbie, MSc, and colleagues. “Low-educated people have trouble providing information about their health problems to health care professionals. It is often hard for them to determine which information their healthcare provider (HCP) needs. The majority of them lack the health care vocabulary to report symptoms accurately, and they tend to provide information in a way that is illogical and difficult to comprehend by their HCP. Having trouble providing information causes problems in patient-provider interaction, which impacts health outcomes negatively.”
The study enrolled 24 physical therapy patients with differing levels of education to gauge their experience using DTTSQ through think-aloud and retrospective interviews. Twenty of the participants experiencing one or more problems during the response process. These problems mostly concerned interpretations of questions and answer options. Complications were mainly centered around patients’ reporting their level of pain and selecting impaired activities. While the DTTSQ was able to improve the understanding and comprehensibility of the questionnaire, it negatively affected the interpretation, retrieval and response selection within the process.
“The use of plain language and ICT within the DTTSQ had both positive and negative effects on the response processes of its target population,” concluded Welbie and colleagues. “The results of this study emphasize the importance of earlier recommendations to accompany any adaption of any questionnaire to a new mode of delivery by demonstrating the difference and equivalence between the two different modes and to scientifically evaluate the applicability of the newly developed mode of the questionnaire in its intended setting. This is especially important in a digital era in which the use of plain language within health care is increasingly being advocated.”
Cara joined TriMed Media in 2016 and is currently a Senior Writer for Clinical Innovation & Technology. Originating from Detroit, Michigan, she holds a Bachelors in Health Communications from Grand Valley State University.