Health Literacy
Not an actual patient.
B-CLEAR Initiative
The AstraZeneca B-CLEAR initiative was developed to bridge the health literacy gap between patients and their healthcare providers. Below, you will find helpful information and materials that you can give to your patients.
Understanding Health Literacy
Personal Health Literacy
Personal health literacy is a measure of your patients’ ability to successfully navigate their way through their care. It is a measure of their capacity to obtain and comprehend details regarding their own healthcare, and then ultimately act on that information.1
Health literacy is an important component of a patient’s overall health. It’s important to tailor your communication style to ensure patients understand what you’re telling them.2,3
Not an actual doctor/patient.
Improving health literacy to help patients
Helping patients overcome health literacy challenges may contribute to enhancing their understanding and experiences with their care.4 It can lead to:
Improvements in preventative care4
Increased self-management of chronic conditions (eg, diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension)4
Greater medication compliance3
Reductions in the volume of dosing errors, as well as unnecessary ER visits, hospital stays, and readmissions4
Low Health Literacy Red Flags3
- Missing appointments
- Lack of follow-through on additional appointments/tests
- Few/no follow-up questions, which may indicate that they don’t understand what is being explained to them
- Nonadherence to medication
- Incomplete intake forms
Strategies to Engage Patients and Caregivers With Health Literacy Challenges
Speak in Plain Language: Speak simply to avoid “medical jargon.”
Short, direct sentences can help patients better understand what you’re trying to communicate.3
Follow Up & Confirm: After you’ve explained a concept or topic to your patient, follow up to ensure they understand what you’re communicating.
Open-ended questions (eg, “How does this make you feel?”, “If you left the office now, what would you do next?”) can help to catalyze further discussions and may provide insight into what patients are not understanding.3
Turn It Over to the Patient: Once you’ve finished explaining something to your patient, ask them to repeat it back to you. If key points are omitted, it may be a sign that your patient did not fully understand what you were telling them.3
Use Creative Approaches: Explaining a concept using visual aids can help patients understand more quickly.
Consider tools like drawings and illustrations or metaphors and analogies to help improve comprehension. More traditional tools like videos and visual models are also valuable.3
References: 1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. What is health literacy? Accessed September 11, 2025. https://www.cdc.gov/health-literacy/php/about/index.html 2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Understanding health literacy. Accessed September 11, 2025. https://www.cdc.gov/health-literacy/php/about/understanding.html 3. Pennsylvania Health Literacy Coalition. Delivering health literate care: a quick reference guide. Accessed September 11, 2025. https://healthliteracypa.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Updated-PDF-of-Kardex.pdf 4. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Appendix C. Improving health and the bottom line: the case for health literacy. In: Building the Case for Health Literacy: Proceedings of a Workshop. The National Academies Press; 2018:95-151.
Downloadable Materials
These resources can help your patients learn more about life with blood cancer.
Video Resources
Educational videos for both you and your patients aimed at improving health literacy.
Bringing Clarity to Blood Cancer: A Health Literacy Video for Patients
This short video helps answer important questions patients may have about their blood cancer and outlines common terms associated with their treatment journey.
Asset ID - US-87970
Bringing Clarity to Blood Cancer: A Health Literacy Video for Patients (Spanish)
A Spanish-language version of our Bringing Clarity to Blood Cancer video is also available.
AstraZeneca has developed Spanish-language educational resources as part of our commitment to equity in promoting health literacy.
