Health Literacy and Quality of Care among Latino Immigrants in the United States

Health literacy is essential to navigate the U.S. health care system and to promote mutual understanding and shared decision making between patients and health care professionals. Latino immigrants have lower levels of health literacy than other ethnic and racial groups in the United States, but little is known about the impact of health literacy on their quality of care (QoC). To address this gap in the literature, the author examined data from a nationally representative sample of 2,996 immigrants from the 2007 Pew Hispanic Center and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Hispanic Healthcare Survey. Data were analyzed using weighted logistic regression and controlled for immigrants’ sociodemographic characteristics and barriers to health care. Results revealed that immigrants with higher levels of health literacy reported better QoC and that inadequate health literacy influenced immigrants’ QoC beyond education and income, English proficiency, health insurance coverage, and having a regular place of care. Screening for health literacy could increase the attention given to Latino immigrants’ understanding of health information in the context of health care and contribute to the development of interventions that improve the QoC and the health outcomes of one of the most vulnerable segments of the U.S. population.