| Understanding the complexity of multiple health conditions, treatment options, and medications requires a high level of health literacy. Yet, 88% of Americans have some deficiency in health literacy. The nursing literature is lacking in best practices for teaching nursing students how to address health literacy concepts with their patients. Therefore, this basic qualitative study explored Bachelor's of Science in Nursing (BSN) students' educational preparation to integrate health literacy in patient education. The primary research questions asked, How do BSN students describe their preparation to integrate health literacy in patient education? The study used a purposive sample of 13 junior and senior BSN students to explore their experiences with health literacy. Nine participants were junior students, while the remaining four were seniors. An open-ended, semi-structured interview technique was used as a guide for asking seven health literacy sub-questions. Hatch's (2002) nine-step typological framework was used for the data analysis. Six themes identified from this research included that participants were taught health literacy concepts early in their BSN program and found clinical rotations to be the most helpful in fully understanding how to integrate health literacy in patient education. Teach-back and return demonstrations were methods the participants used to verify patient understanding. The majority of the participants experienced challenges related to cultural and language barriers. Implications for BSN curriculum include having students develop written patient education material at the patient's health literacy level, role-playing using clear, simple language, and using preceptors to demonstrate patient education. Further research of a quantitative nature is needed to determine effective teaching strategies. |
