Information Services and Use

In a steadily growing effort, the world has witnessed more than three decades of effort in research, practice, and policy to socially construct what has been identified as ‘health literacy. While much of the earlier work in health literacy was in the United States, the extent of scholars and practitioners is now truly global. To advance international health literacy, the chapter highlights the role of the World Health Organization (WHO) and a series of international conferences that began in 1980s. More specifically, the chapter outlines World Health Organization’s overarching health literacy efforts, notes the importance of health literacy within WHO’s new organization structure, briefly describes how the concept of health literacy emerged throughout a generation of the WHO’s international conferences, suggests an ethical foundation for the WHO’s health literacy work, and explains how the groundwork set by the WHO provides some challenges and foundations for future health literacy research and practice.

This report focuses on opportunities, challenges and outcomes of health literacy related interventions in Israel, based on health literacy measurement. The importance of a system’s and community approaches are discussed, as is cultural appropriateness. Two case studies are highlighted - the first on childhood immunization and the second on self-management of chronic health situations. In the second example, a combination of community, media, digital, and face-to-face interventions comprise a broad approach to intervention. The impact and some findings are presented, including conclusions derived from each initiative.

Today’s health care journalists work in a very different environment than those of yesterday. The demand for stories and broadcasts has grown exponentially, and the resources available have shrunk dramatically. While it may therefore be difficult to see how improvements in health care journalism are possible, let alone a way to improve health care literacy, there is an important connection that, if illuminated, could help both fields. To understand the literature on the quality of health care journalism, it is critical to understand the backgrounds of today’s health care journalists and the challenges they face. That literature also goes hand in hand with studies of the effects that news coverage has on the public’s understanding of health care issues. There are training and educational programs designed to help health care journalists do their jobs better, and this chapter concludes with a discussion of how cooperation between health journalists, physicians, and other stakeholders can lift all boats.

Health literacy research and interventions have provided multiple tools to improve communication between professionals and patients in clinical contexts for many years. Despite the reality that many patients participate in clinical trials in conjunction with standard medical care, only recently have efforts extended to address and improve the health literacy of both clinical trial researchers and participants. To date, the primary focus of health literacy activities in clinical trials has centered on communicating trial results to trial participants. This report describes the opportunities and strategies necessary to layer health literacy activities across the clinical trial process from consent to conclusion.

There is an urgent need for employees from diverse backgrounds in the health field. Community colleges are where many low-income and under-represented students begin their academic career. A career pipeline program was implemented at a community college to promote rigorous health careers, facilitate transfer success and develop information literacy skills. We assessed students’ confidence with fitting into a career, the impact of the program on students’ academic and career choices, salient program components, successes and challenges, and suggestions for improvement. Fifty-nine students enrolled in the program and 64% (n = 38) completed, all were minority students. Students reported increased confidence with fitting into their career and a positive impact on their choice of academic and career paths. Important aspects of the program were exposure to health professionals, mentoring, peer connections, academic and professional skill building, developing information literacy and experiential learning. Most students are either pursing a bachelor degree or have graduated with the intent of pursing graduate degree. Our experience demonstrates the feasibility of implementing a health career pipeline at a community college. Future programs should focus on career and academic skill building, information literacy, mentoring, peer connection, experiential activities, targeted outreach to male students, and facilitating the transfer process.

The Implementing FAIR Data for People and Machines: Impacts and Implications workshop was organized by the Board on Research Data and Information of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), the CENDI Federal Information Managers Group, the Research Data Alliance (RDA), and the National Federation of Advanced Information Services (NFAIS), and held at NASEM’s Keck Center in Washington, DC on September 11, 2019. The goals of the Implementing FAIR Data workshop were to discuss the current status of FAIR data implementation, share what is being done to encourage scientists to share data in machine-readable formats, and examine the implications of FAIR data implementation for people and machines. FAIR data policies, tools, and measures of FAIR data compliance were considered from multiple perspectives. Marcia McNutt, President of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), offered opening remarks, and the keynote address was presented by Barend Mons, Professor of Bioinformatics at Leiden University Medical Center and President of the International Science Council’s Committee on Data (CODATA). Three panel discussions addressed (1) the perspectives of scientists and administrators from U.S. federal agencies, (2) case studies on the implementation of FAIR data practices, and (3) principles and methods of measuring FAIR data compliance. The automation of scientific workflows was discussed by Stuart Feldman, Chief Scientist of Schmidt Futures, a philanthropic organization devoted to investing in research, technology, and science. The workshop closed with highlights and takeaways from each session as summarized by the moderators, followed by general questions.

The provision, processing and distribution of research information are increasingly supported by the use of research information systems (RIS) at higher education institutions. National and international exchange formats or standards can support the validation and use of research information and increase their informative value and comparability through consistent semantics. The formats are very overlapping and represent different approaches to modeling. This paper presents the data model of the Research Core Dataset (RCD) and discusses its impact on data quality in RIS. Subsequently compares it with the Europe-wide accepted Common European Research Information Format (CERIF) standard to support the implementation of the RCD with CERIF compatibility in the RIS and so that institutions integrate their research information from internal and external heterogeneous data sources to ultimately provide valuable information with high levels of data quality. As these are fundamental to decision-making and knowledge generation as well as the presentation of research.