Abstract Body (Do not enter title and authors here): Health literacy reflects the ability to make appropriate health decisions and affects health outcomes. It therefore is an important parameter in patient care and for health care providers. Health literacy in patients undergoing coronary angiography, the standard procedure for the definite evaluation of coronary artery disease (CAD) is unclear and is addressed in the present study.
We recruited 515 consecutive patients (383 men and 132 women) undergoing coronary angiography for the evaluation of established or suspected stable CAD in a tertiary care setting in central Europe. Health literacy was measured using the validated HLS-EU-Q16 questionnaire.
A response rate of 80.4% was achieved. Overall, 177 patients (i.e. 34.3% of the cohort) had type 2 diabetes (T2DM); the prevalence of T2DM was 36.8% in men and in 27.3% in women (p=0.047). Comparing T2DM patients to those who did not have diabetes, overall median health literacy scores (HLS) were 13 [IQR=11-15] vs. 13 [IQR=10-15] among men (p=0.424) and 12 [IQR=10-15] vs. 13 [IQR=10.25-15] among women (p=0.517). Prevalence rates of adequate (HLS 13-16), problematic (HLS 9-12) and inadequate (HLS 0-8) health literacy did not differ significantly between patients with T2DM vs. subjects without T2DM (53.0% vs. 55.4%, 34.8% vs. 29.9% and 12.2% vs. 14.7% among men and 37.5% vs. 55.6%, 45.8% vs. 31.9% and 16.7% vs. 12.5% among women, respectively.
We conclude that among patients undergoing coronary angiography for the evaluation of established or suspected stable CAD, health literacy regardless of sex is suboptimal both in patients with T2DM and in non-diabetic subjects.