HRSA Introduces Training Tool to Improve Provider-Patient Communication

HRSA has launched a new Web-based health communications training tool designed to improve interaction between health care providers and their patients.

The interactive training course, “Unified Health Communication: Addressing Health Literacy, Cultural Competency, and Limited English Proficiency,” aims to raise the quality of provider-patient interactions by teaching providers and their staff how to gauge and respond to their patients' health literacy, cultural background, and language skills.

The course's five modules take four to five hours to complete. Modules 1 through 4 provide an introduction to health communication, health literacy, cultural competency, and limited English proficiency. In Module 5, participants can apply information learned in previous modules to test their ability to communicate effectively with patients. Self-paced instruction allows participants to complete one or more modules at a time. The modules' textual information is enhanced by colorful graphics, interactive elements and video vignettes.

HRSA Administrator Elizabeth Duke said the course “puts HRSA in a position of advancing health literacy efforts in an innovative way.”

HRSA's Center for Quality led HRSA's Health Literacy Work Group and Health Literacy Training Team, whose members collaborated to develop the training course with input from staff across the agency. Along with the Center for Quality, the team included members from HRSA's Office of Minority Health and Health Disparities and Office of Equal Opportunity and Civil Rights. The U.S. Department of Justice also consulted on the project.

Continuing education credits for completing the course will be made available from the American Academy of Physician Assistants, the American Association for Health Education, the American Pharmacists Association, and the National Committee for Quality Assurance.

The course was previewed at the 2007 annual meeting of the American Public Health Association in Washington, D.C., in early November.

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