Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Dec 20;12(1):11.
doi: 10.3390/healthcare12010011.

Assessment Tools for Measuring Health Literacy and Digital Health Literacy in a Hospital Setting: A Scoping Review

Eline M Dijkman  1   2 , Wouter W M Ter Brake  1 , Constance H C Drossaert  3 , Carine J M Doggen  1   4
Affiliations

Assessment Tools for Measuring Health Literacy and Digital Health Literacy in a Hospital Setting: A Scoping Review

Eline M Dijkman et al. Healthcare (Basel). .

Abstract

Assessment of (digital) health literacy in the hospital can raise staff awareness and facilitate tailored communication, leading to improved health outcomes. Assessment tools should ideally address multiple domains of health literacy, fit to the complex hospital context and have a short administration time, to enable routine assessment. This review aims to create an overview of tools for measuring (digital) health literacy in hospitals. A search in Scopus, PubMed, WoS and CINAHL, following PRISMA guidelines, generated 7252 hits; 251 studies were included in which 44 assessment tools were used. Most tools (57%) were self-reported and 27% reported an administration time of <5 min. Almost all tools addressed the domain 'understanding' (98%), followed by 'access' (52%), 'apply' (50%), 'appraise' (32%), 'numeracy' (18%), and 'digital' (18%). Only four tools were frequently used: the Newest Vital Sign (NVS), the Short Test of Functional Health Literacy for Adults ((S)TOFHLA), the Brief Health Literacy Screener (BHLS), and the Health Literacy Questionnaire (HLQ). While the NVS and BHLS have a low administration time, they cover only two domains. HLQ covers the most domains: access, understanding, appraise, and apply. None of these four most frequently used tools measured digital skills. This review can guide health professionals in choosing an instrument that is feasible in their daily practice, and measures the required domains.

Keywords: assessment tool; digital health literacy; ehealth literacy; health literacy; hospital; instrument.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
PRISMA flowchart of the search process.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. OECD Length of Hospital Stay (Indicator) 2023. [(accessed on 24 November 2023)]. Available online: https://data.oecd.org/healthcare/length-of-hospital-stay.htm.
    1. Safeer R.S., Keenan J. Health literacy: The gap between physicians and patients. Am. Fam. Physician. 2005;72:463–468. - PubMed
    1. National Library of Medicine An Introduction to Health Literacy. [(accessed on 24 November 2023)]; Available online: https://www.nnlm.gov/guides/intro-health-literacy.
    1. Sorensen K., Van den Broucke S., Fullam J., Doyle G., Pelikan J., Slonska Z., Brand H., Consortium Health Literacy Project E. Health literacy and public health: A systematic review and integration of definitions and models. BMC Public Health. 2012;12:80. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-12-80. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Sorensen K., Pelikan J.M., Rothlin F., Ganahl K., Slonska Z., Doyle G., Fullam J., Kondilis B., Agrafiotis D., Uiters E., et al. Health literacy in Europe: Comparative results of the European health literacy survey (HLS-EU) Eur. J. Public Health. 2015;25:1053–1058. doi: 10.1093/eurpub/ckv043. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources