Inadequate health literacy is associated with increased asthma morbidity in a population sample

To the Editor:

Health literacy enables patients to understand and to act in their own interests. Limited functional health literacy is associated with lower health status, adverse health outcomes, less frequent preventive health behaviors, less active self-treatment of chronic conditions, and higher health care costs.1 There have been few studies examining health literacy in adult asthma, and these have been predominantly limited to smaller convenience samples. One study found less health literacy was associated with worse asthma-related quality of life, worse physical function, and more emergency department use.2 Inadequate health literacy was associated with lower asthma medication knowledge and worse metered dose inhaler (MDI) technique in hospitalized inner-city adults.3 We aimed to measure the level of functional health literacy in adults with asthma from a representative population sample and explore associations with health status and morbidity.