Health Literacy in 30 Seconds

University at Albany University at Albany Research Headlines















The “REALM-TeenS” tool can quickly assess how well teens understand health information.


ALBANY, N.Y. (April 19, 2017) – Imagine being released from the hospital with a confusing diagnosis, stacks of papers to read and more questions than answers about what to do next.
That is the reality for a large percentage of American teenagers. Many have a limited ability to obtain, process and understand health information and services presented to them – also known as low health literacy. Yet, adolescent health literacy research remains limited compared with adult populations.
Jennifer Manganello has published a new study in Pediatrics that may be able to help fill the gap.
The study, led by Manganello, an associate professor in the Health Policy, Management & Behavior in the School of Public Health, is a collaborative effort to develop a brief assessment tool which identifies adolescent health literacy limitations in less than 30 seconds. It’s called Rapid Estimate of Adolescent Literacy in Medicine, short form “REALM-TeenS.”
The tool requires adolescents to read 10 health-related words from a list of common health care terminology. For example, “diabetes,” “asthma,” “exercise” and “bronchial.” The concept is that if an individual has difficulty pronouncing these words in isolation, he or she is likely to have difficulty with comprehension.
“Numerous studies have indicated low health literacy is linked to negative health outcomes in adults. However, limited research has been done on adolescents,” Manganello said. “REALM-TeenS offers researchers and clinicians a brief screening tool that can be used to quickly assess adolescent health literacy in a variety of settings."














Jennifer Manganello. (photo by Paul Miller)



“REALM-TeenS” is a shorter version of a longer assessment tool “REALM-Teen,” which was developed in 2006 by Terry Davis of the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center, one of the new study collaborators. The original tool required adolescents to read 66 health-related words in three minutes.
The health literacy scores from the 10-word ...

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