The relationship between health literacy and self-care behaviors among patients with heart failure

Insufficient health literacy is a major barrier to self-care in patients with heart failure. The purpose of this study was to determine relationship between health literacy and self-care behaviors in patients with heart failure. Methods & Materials: In this correlational study, 100 patients with heart failure who were referred to teaching hospitals in Qom were selected through the convenience sampling method in 2017. The data collection tools were the heart failure-specific health literacy scale, the self-care of heart failure index (SCHFI) and the hospital anxiety and depression scale (HADS). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, the Pearson’s correlation coefficient and multiple liner regression analysis on the SPSS software version 16. More than half of the patients had a moderate level of self-care. The highest and lowest health literacy scores were respectively related to critical health literacy (10.47±2.56) and functional health literacy (9.14±3.74). The result of multiple regression analysis showed that only functional health literacy was a better predictor of self-care behaviors in patients with heart failure (β=0.30, P=0.014). The findings showed that functional health literacy was an important predictor of self-care behaviors among patients with heart failure. It seems necessary to design effective interventions in order to improve patients’ skills for analyzing functional information and decision making in self-care.