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Abstract
Mental health issues are mostly related to the problems such as depression, anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder, mood disorder, psychotic disorders, and personality disorders. They may develop as a result of several factors such as family factors, biological factors, and social factors. Patients of these disorders and their family members require an elevated level of education to deal with these problems. Therefore, it is important to improve the patient education materials that would help in conveying as much essential information to the patients and their family members as possible. In this regard, patients’ education materials can be tested for their ease of reading. In this study, three patient education materials related to mental health issues have been analyzed using Flesch–Kincaid readability test/scale, and it has been found that two of them are not at the level of ease of reading. This paper also deals with the study of learner characteristics.
Mental disorders consist of many psychiatric and mental health problems such as depression, anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder, mood disorder, psychotic disorders, and personality disorders. Mental disorders can be caused by family history, biological factors, and/or other risk factors such as exposure of mother to viruses or other toxic chemicals during pregnancy or use of illegal drugs (MedlinePlus, 2016). It is important to educate patients about the disorders with the help of patient education materials, so that the problems that can be caused by these disorders could be reduced.
Health Literacy
Patient education materials for this study include
“Adjustment disorder” available at https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000932.htm;
“Anxiety disorders” available at http://umm.edu/health/medical/reports/articles/anxiety-disorders, and
“What is an anxiety disorder?” Available at http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/6E02F4C9EA81857FCA257BF000212085/$File/whatanx2.pdf
Flesch–Kincaid readability test/scale is among the most commonly used tests to determine the readability of the instructional or educational materials. In this test, 100 words are selected that are not from the introduction paragraph. Average sentence length is measured by counting the number of words and dividing them by the number of sentences. Word length is determined by estimating the number of syllables. Syllables are divided by the number of words in the sample. This is then multiplied by 100. Average word length is determined by multiplying it by 0.846, and the average sentence length is measured by multiplying it by 1.015. Then, the formula, RE = 206.835 – 0.846(WL) – 1.015(SL), is used to determine the reading ease (RE) score. The reading ease score has a value from zero to 100, i.e. ranging from practically unreadable to very easy to read (Bastable, 2008).
According to Flesch–Kincaid readability scale, “Adjustment disorder” available at https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000932.htm, is “Fairly easy” to read with a Grade Level of 7. It has reading ease score of 72. According to Flesch–Kincaid readability scale, “Anxiety disorders” available at http://umm.edu/health/medical/reports/articles/anxiety-disorders, is “Fairly Difficult” to read as it has a reading ease score of about 52. It has a Grade Level of 10 to 12. According to Flesch–Kincaid readability scale, “What is an anxiety disorder?” Available at http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/6E02F4C9EA81857FCA257BF000212085/$File/whatanx2.pdf, is “Difficult” to read as it has a reading ease score of about 46. It has a Grade level of College.
In order to improve the effectiveness of patient education material, number of sentences can be increased while retaining the number of words, i.e. average sentence length has to be reduced. Complex grammatical structures such as colons, semicolons, and commas, etc., have to be minimally used. One way of reducing long sentences is to reduce the use of connective words that would make the sentences long and complex. This can be an effective way as syllables cannot be reduced due to the presence of complex terms. However, writers have to try to use simple vocabulary while avoiding multisyllabic words, i.e. words with one or two syllables have to be used maximally.
In the above mentioned patient education materials, most of the information has been presented in the bulleted form, which is an efficient way of communicating information while making it slightly easy to understand. Another important way of effective communication is the use of the same word rather than using synonyms. Statistics and mathematical values have to be used minimally or in a separate paragraph, so that the patients would be able to comprehend the information easily. Usually, patients have increased level of concentration in the start of the reading material, so important information has to be provided in the start of the reading material.
Learner Characteristics
Patients of mental health issues and their family members and/or friends require more educational instruction rather than medicinal intervention. Proper counseling and instruction can help them in dealing with most of their problems. One of the most important things to consider while giving information to the learners is to check their literacy level. Literacy is usually considered as the ability of adults to read, write, and understand information at the level of 8th grade or above. Literacy is not only related to comprehension of health-related information but also related to the ability of using computers to get information.
In order to improve the learning, four types of readiness can be considered for learners (Brooker & Waugh, 2013). These types, and their related characteristics and implications are described below:
References
Bastable, S. B. (2008). Nurse as Educator: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Brooker, C., & Waugh, A. (2013). Foundations of Nursing Practice: Fundamentals of Holistic Care: Elsevier Health Sciences UK.
MedlinePlus. (2016). Mental Disorders. Retrieved from https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/mentaldisorders.html
