Return-Path: <root> Received: (from root@localhost) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) id f7VBrNh09636 for health-archive@nifl.gov; Fri, 31 Aug 2001 07:53:23 -0400 (EDT) Resent-Message-Id: <200108311153.f7VBrNh09636@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from blount.mail.mindspring.net (blount.mail.mindspring.net [207.69.200.226]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with ESMTP id f2UFiUg02966 for <NIFL-HEALTH@Literacy.nifl.gov>; Fri, 30 Mar 2001 10:44:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from l1d9f0 (user-2ive15b.dialup.mindspring.com [165.247.4.171]) by blount.mail.mindspring.net (8.9.3/8.8.5) with SMTP id KAA32435 for <NIFL-HEALTH@Literacy.nifl.gov>; Fri, 30 Mar 2001 10:44:27 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <000a01c0b92d$68f30dc0$ab04f7a5@l1d9f0> From: "Helen Osborne" <Helen@healthliteracy.com> To: "NIFL-Health" <NIFL-HEALTH@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: April's Guest Discussion Leader Date: Fri, 30 Mar 2001 10:23:43 -0500 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Resent-From: root@literacy.nifl.gov Resent-Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2001 07:53:22 -0400 Resent-To: health-archive@nifl.gov Status: O Content-Length: 2539 Lines: 49 It is a pleasure to introduce Mark Hochhauser, Ph.D., as a guest discussion leader on NIFL-Health from April 1 - 7, 2001. Mark is an active participant on our list, and has graciously agreed to lead us in a discussion about the organizational side of literacy and readability. I asked Mark to tell us a little about his background in health literacy. Many years ago, Mark was an Education Director in a psychiatric/chemical dependency. He worked closely with the Rehabilitation Director and found many patients with learning disabilities having a hard time understanding their reading assignments in the drug treatment program. Some patients had been told for most of their lives that they were "dumb" or "stupid"--so they left the hospital against medical advice rather than go through that embarrassment again when other patients saw their reading problems, or the difficulties they had in oral presentations before the group. Mark and the Rehabilitation Director did some readability statistics on the reading materials, and pointed out to program staff that some patients might not be able to read or understand the materials they were given as part of their treatment. They suggested that the staff adjust the reading assignments to take into account the gap between the reading level of the materials and the reading abilities of the patients. The staff refused. Mark realizes that literacy and readability are not just patient issues, but organizational issues as well. His questions to NIFL-Health are: * What organizational barriers have you faced when you try to make documents more readable? * If you've been able to overcome those barriers, what suggestions do you have for other members of this group who might be struggling within their organizations? * If you haven't been able to overcome these barriers, what do you need for your organization to change? As before when we have had guest discussion leaders, please keep these basics in mind: * In order to promote active discussion, you are encouraged to post messages to NIFL-Health rather than just to Mark. This is one instance when hitting "reply" is a good idea. * Feel free to contact me directly at helen@healthliteracy.com with ideas and concerns you'd rather not share with all 500+ subscribers. Please join me in welcoming Mark, Helen Helen Osborne, MEd., OTR/L Co-moderator, NIFL-Health Author of "Overcoming Communication Barriers in Patient Education" Phone: 508-653-1199 * Fax: 508-650-9492 mailto:Helen@healthliteracy.com http://www.healthliteracy.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Fri Jan 18 2002 - 11:28:30 EST