So you’ve made it into your favorite Texas college. Congrats!!! I bet you’ll make sure your academic literacy will be in perfect order but there’s more that will shape you into an independent, healthy, open-minded, and successful human being.
Regardless of whether you’re looking to secure a safe and sound career or want to go the road of entrepreneurship, there’s more to it. So check out this post about health literacy!
Health Literacy
The necessity to have fluency in discussing health and other related conditions is critical for individuals whose occupation borders on caring for people such as personal trainers. This is to ensure that the exercise routine for a client is appropriate to his health condition.
High-risk conditions include those with diabetes and heart ailments. A trainer’s objective should be aimed at providing optimal movement and exercise for a client to fit his health requirement.
What is health literacy
We can define health literacy as an individual’s ability to understand what it takes to be and/or in good physical and mental order and to know how to apply behavioral methods to stay in good health.
Behavior, knowledge, and attitude form a unity that can reflect an individual’s health literacy. A person’s behavior can be affected by knowledge, so if students have good health knowledge, their behavior to maintain good health will probably also be better than if they wouldn’t have a thorough understanding of what good health is all about.
When students have good health literacy, they will be more likely to behave responsibly and develop a sense of responsibility regarding their own health and the health of their families and communities.
Health literacy is the ability to obtain, comprehend, evaluate, and apply or use health information.
During university or college education, health literacy is crucial as then, students have the opportunity to accumulate health-related information the best way. We see, however, that that’s not happening.
Their scientific affairs council supports the efforts to increase patient literacy, also among students, by teaching them how to read and comprehend the written prescription on pill containers, appointment slips, and other health-related documents.
The objective is to adequately equip patients with the knowledge to understand materials that are critical to their health condition and work toward better prevention among college and university students.
The American Medical Association (AMA) holds seminars for the training of health professionals and volunteers regarding students’ health literacy. It goes without saying that this is key all through a student’s life in college.
Manage your health
A high level of health literacy helps individuals better manage their health. While there are some health professionals who devote extra time to explain medical terminologies to patients, this is more of an exception rather than the rule.
So to get the most of your consultation time with physicians, students must make sure that they ask questions if something is unclear to them.
It is critical that you, as a student, understand the nature of your condition if you have been diagnosed, and the different ways of managing it. This includes medications, special exercises, and dietary restrictions, if applicable.
It’s actually no wonder that many teachers are worried about the social networking behavior of their students which may easily lead to social isolation.
A lot of people resort to self-care instead of seeking the advice of a licensed physician. While this may not be entirely negative, you can be wasting time that can be used for the proper diagnosis and treatment of your condition.
Many students, particularly those in their freshman year, are combining too much sugary and fatty food (often in unlimited portions) with sodas to get the “Freshman 15″ (the 15 extra pounds often gained by students in their first year in college).
Take a physician’s advice
Make an appointment with your doctor and do not be embarrassed about your problems because health practitioners are trained to competently handle health concerns.
A survey done on student-patients showed that a lot of patients do not understand why they have to schedule a follow-up appointment, around two-thirds do not know that there are required conditions when taking different drug preparations such as pills that should be taken on an empty stomach as opposed to medicines that should be taken after eating.
Other information that patients can benefit from is knowing whether they are qualified for financial assistance from the government or not. The ultimate objective of improving literacy in this field is to enable patients to read, understand, and use health information.
Students health literacy
Well, the fact of the matter is that health literacy, and especially among students, includes multi-dimensional aspects. It is generally considered by physicians to be one of the primary public health concerns among college students.
Often these aspects are neglected in studies so the knowledge of health literacy among college students is rather limited among the general public. Aspects of a college’s cultural identity will usually lead to well-rounded cultural literacy, but health literacy is just that important, if not more.
Despite the fact that many studies have assessed health literacy in general, only a little research was conducted in relation to health literacy among young adults. We know that smoking and alcohol consumption among college students are seriously threatening their health.
And because health literacy is closely related to various settings in which healthcare information is available, it is high time to measure, assess, and address health literacy concerns among university and college students, and evaluate the relationship between these concerns and their health education.
It is generally accepted that health literacy among university and college students is absolutely insufficient. Their academic subject courses are generally not related to health education.