Health Literacy Missouri: A St. Louis based organization that provides training, assessments, plain language reviews, and offers resources. Their Health Literacy Express is a series of 30-60 minute training sessions.
JAMA Forum: Why Health Insurance Literacy Matters This article provides an analysis of a recently conducted Kaiser Family Foundation survey: “Assessing Americans’ Familiarity with Health Insurance Terms and Concepts.” The survey found that consumers understood some insurance concepts and terms, but had a greater difficulty when calculations were involved. (Levitt, Larry. Journal of American Medical Association. November 26, 2014)
Consumers’ Misunderstanding of Health Insurance (PDF) The authors surveyed Americans with Private insurance to see whether they found co-pay insurance easier to understand and use than traditional insurance, with deductibles and co-insurance. The authors concluded that consumers better understood co-pay only plans, but found only weak evidence that these plans would cause people to make different choices and lower costs. (Loewenstein, George, et al. Journal of Health Economics, June 26, 2013)
Developing a Measure of Health Insurance Literacy: Understanding Consumers’ Ability to Choose and Use Insurance (PDF) In this issue brief, the authors describe consumer problems selecting and using health. According to the brief, the American Institutes for Research was developing a measure of health insurance literacy to objectively assess what consumers with private insurance do and do not understand about insurance. (Paez, Kathryn et al., American Institutes for Research, February 20, 2013)
Health Literacy Implications of the Affordable Care Act (PDF) This study provides an analysis of the ACA and insights into the opportunities it presents for promoting health literacy, including in the areas of coverage expansion, equity, workforce, patient information, public health and wellness and quality. (Somers, Stephen & Mahadevan, Roopa. Center for Health Care Strategies, Inc., November 2010)
Knowledge Is Power: Focusing on Health Insurance Literacy May Increase Health Coverage Retention In this blog post, the author analyzes a nationally-representative post-enrollment consumer survey from April 2014 and concludes that people who enrolled had greater knowledge about the provisions of the ACA, and were more comfortable with the financial commitment than those who remained uninsured. (Stern, Sophie. Enroll America, August 22, 2014)
Low ACA Knowledge and Health Literacy Hinder Young Adult Marketplace Enrollment This blog post, explaining survey findings, concludes that half of young adults were aware of provision in the ACA allowing individuals up to age 26 to remain on their parents’ private health insurance policies. (Long, Sharon et al., Health Affairs Blog, February 12, 2014)
