I just finished reading The Associate, the latest of John Grisham's 22 bestsellers. A former attorney who now writes legal thrillers, Grisham has had a career most writers can only dream of. The secret to his success? It's simple: readability. Grisham's conversational writing style draws readers in, paints a picture and makes them feel part of the story. And, like many of today's top-selling authors, he writes at a 7th grade reading level.
Why is this necessary? Because the average adult in the United States reads at an 8th grade level, and many, I'm sorry to say, struggle with even poorer reading and comprehension skills. This fact is of critical importance in the medical setting, where the ability to understand and follow instructions can be a matter of life and death. And on a larger scale, studies suggest low health literacy could be a major factor in the nation's health care crisis.
Functional health literacy, as defined by the AMA Council of Scientific Affairs, is "the ability to read and comprehend prescription bottles, appointment slips and other essential health-related materials required to successfully function as a patient." And limited health literacy skills, according to the Center for Health Care Strategies -- a nonprofit group that strives to improve the health care experience for people in government programs like Medicare and Medicaid -- "are a stronger predictor of an individual's health status than age, income, employment status, education level, and racial or ethnic group."
Citing a number of independent studies, the CHCS points out that people with low health literacy are less likely to understand information and instructions given to them by doctors, pharmacists and insurers; less likely to act upon this information; and less likely to be able to navigate the health care system. These same individuals are more likely to receive services through publicly financed health care programs and incur higher health care costs.
And it appears that this problem is even more widespread than most of us would have guessed; the National Adult Literacy Survey reports that 23 percent of U.S. adults are functionally illiterate. As the Center for Health Care Strategies says, this report suggests "nearly 50 percent of all adults may have problems understanding prescriptions, appointment slips, informed consent documents, insurance forms and health education materials."
This is a frightening stat for agents. But we can pick up a few tips from O'Reilly Media's Head First series of computer programming language books. Claiming to know "what turns your brain on," O'Reilly uses a number of techniques to get and keep the reader's attention:
- Use pictures: "Your brain is tuned for visuals, not text. As far as your brain's concerned, a picture really is worth a thousand words."
- Use redundancy: Say the same thing in different ways and with different media types.
- Surprise them: Your brain is tuned for novelty and pays attention to emotional content.
- Use a conversational style: Your brain pays more attention "when it believes you're in a conversation than if it thinks you're passively listening to a presentation."
- Include activities: Your brain learns and remembers more when you do something than when you read something.
- Use people - in pictures, stories and examples: "You're a person. And your brain pays more attention to people than it does to things."
It's important we recognize the comprehension level of our groups and do everything we can to make sure they understand their benefits. By creating simple and attractive written material, using easy-to-understand terms, getting the audience involved in our enrollment meetings, and providing an atmosphere where employees feel comfortable asking questions, we can have a real impact on both the health literacy and the overall health of our clients.
Eric Johnson can be reached at 817-366-7536 or eric.johnson@agentallies.com.
