Page 33 - Health Literacy, eHealth, and Communication: Putting the Consumer First: Workshop Summary

Health Literacy, eHealth, and Communication: Putting the Consumer First: Workshop Summary

HeALtH LiteRACY, eHeALtH, AnD CoMMUniCAtion

system. What AHCCCS is attempting is to integrate the system virtually—
to integrate it with information and to integrate more rapid deployment of
knowledge—which should result in improved quality and reduced costs.
In such a system one would have the same information reference points
no matter where one was located—in a community clinic, a physician’s
office, or elsewhere.
Phase I will include a focus on interactive multimedia product devel-
opment that goes beyond static health content. Such products will include
e-learning modules, electronic health assessments, Web-based health
13
coaching, Web-logs, streaming video, Web-based health awareness cam-
paigns, eHealth-connected provider offices for access to downloadable
personalized health videos, and podcasts.
Multimedia education will focus first on raising the health literacy of
those with chronic diseases and, in particular, will be aimed at helping
individuals understand their chronic illnesses. Over time the materials
will address other important conditions and situations of relevance for the
AHCCCS population, for example, how to keep one’s health care cover-
age in place and how to use one’s health plan.
eHealth education will be personalized. The information that a person
retains from an educational program is dependent upon a number of fac-
tors including to whom that individual relates well and who is providing
the education. In many education efforts the same product is delivered in
the same way by the same person. AHCCCS’s goal is to deliver education
in a much more personal and culturally sensitive manner, tailoring the
important content of that education to the various needs of the population
and using messengers who are similar to and can relate to members of
various populations. Additionally, these multimedia education programs
will be developed in English, Spanish, and in some cases Native American
languages.
AHCCCS strategies for building eHealth literacy products include
knowledge-building programming capability and rapid production of e-
learning programs with multiple content sources. The rapid production
goal for AHCCCS staff is to produce a new program every day. If it takes
2 months to develop and deliver each audio or video program, that is too
long. In a rapid production cycle, content is duplicated but it is delivered
by a different person and is aimed at a different population. One can do a
great deal with today’s camcorders and digital equipment. One does not
need a $100,000 studio; one needs just a couple of creative people with a
camera. To establish that the programs actually work, innovation centers,

13 A streaming video is a “one-way video transmission over a data network. It is widely
used on the Web as well as company networks to play video clips and video broadcasts”
(Techweb, 2008).

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