SILS to co-host MLA teleconference
on health information literacy

As part of a nationwide effort to improve health literacy, www.unchealthcare.org, UNC’s Health Sciences Library and the School of Information and Library Science will host the Medical Library Association's satellite teleconference, "Reading Between the Lines: Focusing on Health Information Literacy" on Wednesday, September 10, from 2:00-4:30 p.m. in Berryhill Hall (Room 103).

The Institute of Medicine of the National Academies has identified health literacy as one of the country’s top priorities for improving the quality and delivery of health care. Health information literacy is the ability to understand basic health care communications, such as prescription instructions, test results and insurance forms. Based on research by the National Adult Literacy Survey, 90 million Americans – half of all adults – may struggle with low health literacy, resulting in poor health outcomes and costing the health care system up to $73 billion in added expenses every year. Further studies show that people of all ages, races, income and education levels and suffering from all types of medical conditions, are challenged by this problem. The Institute’s report, called Priority Areas for National Action: Transforming Health Care Quality, describes efforts to improve health literacy as “essential for effective self-management and collaborative care.”

The goal of this teleconference is to enhance the knowledge of information professionals about the concepts of health information literacy and to highlight opportunities for using these principles to provide quality consumer health and patient education information services. Participants will receive 2 MLA continuing education (CE) contact hours.

The event is free, but pre-registration is required. To pre-register, please contact Lara Bailey at ljbailey@email.unc.edu or by phone at (919) 962-8366. You may also register online at: http://www.hsl.unc.edu/teleconf.htm. Please let us know if you are interested in obtaining the CE contact hours in your email or phone message.

Additional information about this teleconference can be found at: http://www.mlanet.org/education/telecon/healthlit/index.html.

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