Health Literacy Search

NLM® updated the Health Literacy Special Query, one of the Special Queries, to retrieve more health literacy relevant records in PubMed. The pre-formulated search now includes retrieval of citations to articles about self-care perception and articles about comprehension of food labels.
The Reference and Web Services Section of the National Library of Medicine created and maintains this health literacy search strategy.
The MEDLINE/PubMed health literacy search retrieves citations to English language journal literature. See details of the search strategy below.

Search Details

"health literacy" OR
“health literate” OR
“medical literacy” OR
(health [ti] AND
literacy [ti]) OR
(functional [tw] AND
health [tw] AND
literacy [tw]) OR
((low-literate [ti] OR
low-literacy[ti] OR
literacy[ti] OR
illiteracy[ti] OR
literate[ti] OR
illiterate[ti] OR
reading [mh] OR
comprehension [mh]) AND
(health promotion [major] OR
health education [major] OR
patient education [major] OR
communication barriers [major] OR
communication [major:noexp] OR
health knowledge, attitudes, practice [major] OR
attitude to health[major])) OR
(comprehension [major] AND
educational status [major])OR
(family [ti] AND
literacy [ti])OR
(("drug labeling"
OR Prescriptions, drug [mh])
AND "comprehension"))OR numeracy
OR ((cancer[ti] OR diabetes[ti] OR genetic[ti]) AND (literacy[ti] OR comprehension[ti]))
OR “adult literacy” OR
“limited literacy” OR
“patient literacy” OR
“patient understanding”[ti] OR
(self care [major] AND perception[mh]) OR
(comprehension AND food labeling[mh])
AND English [la]

More information: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/services/queries/health_literacy.html