Making it Easy: Health Literacy Outcomes to improve social care Wednesday 26th Oct. Grassmarket Centre Following the exploration of issues relating to health literacy in the Chief Medical Officer’s annual report, Realistic Medicine, the idea of moving towards more supported and shared decision-making has emerged as a key area for action. There was consensus that all practitioners should be encouraged to enquire into everyone’s preferences, with multi-disciplinary teams communicating well and understanding people’s wishes highlighted as vital. Description of project/service/tool Description What will be discussed in the session The traditional "doctor knows best" approach to decision-making has proved inadequate. This sets all of us a challenge as to how we design and develop health and care services so that it brings out the best of the expertise of people and their practitioners. It will require us to make healthcare simpler and more engaging so that it is responsive, particularly to those with the greatest health literacy needs and those with the least support. Practitioners will need to develop the personal capabilities, within an organisational system, that helps them to communicate with and support people to make the decisions that are right for them. What are the big things we need to change? What are the small actions that help us deliver that change? What changes can you make to your own practice to contribute? Key points of interest Further information Briefly outline the key points of interest from the work to date for people to take away from the event/share with others: We need to support more collaborative conversations Checking understanding at all stages is crucial Health literacy is a fundamental part of Realistic Medicine Name: Blythe Robertson Role: Policy Lead for Health Literacy Organisation: Scottish Government Contact Details: 0131 2441773 blythe.robertson@gov.scot -Insert Photo- 1

What going on Teach back House of Care Actions from the Health Lyndsay Murphy – awareness T4T Health literacy place National demonstrator probograme Walk throughs – redesign Pediatric nurology – children with epilepsy Other programmes of work around redesign of appointment letters