A qualitative evaluation of parents’ experiences of health literacy information about common childhood conditions

SelfCare 2018;9(1)1-15

Amanda Lees, Kit Tapson: Health and Wellbeing Research Group, University of Winchester,

Sanjay Patel: Division of Women and Children, Southampton Children’s Hospital

Evaluating resources designed to enhance health literacy is an important and often neglected aspect of self-care. Although small, the study chosen to receive this award yielded findings with practical consequences for how information is delivered to parents and with relevance to others designing health information resources. For this reason the judges considered it a worthy winner of the Annual ISF/SelfCare prize for best published paper in 2018.

Health literacy is an essential enabler of self-care, particularly within groups, such as parents of young children, who frequently access primary care in formal healthcare systems. It is important to understand how best to communicate with these groups and the ways they will use the information provided. This paper was a qualitative evaluation of resources intended to provide information to parents on common childhood ailments.

The judges felt that this was a well-designed and well conducted survey of its kind. The paper clearly articulated the results, and the authors recognised the strengths and weaknesses of their approach.

Make sure your paper is considered for next years’ prize by submitting your work to SelfCare in 2019.

* The award will be paid to the corresponding author, and in the event of multiple authors it is the responsibility of the corresponding author to divide the prize as they deem appropriate. ISF and SelfCare take no responsibility for this decision.