Literature Review

Introduction

Health literacy is the act of knowledge concerning a particular health principle. It helps to apply preventive measures because of studying, reading, or hearing from someone. It involves the creation of awareness concerning the health issue in context. In most cases – even outside health—knowledge helps keep one safe from fall. Ignorance is the primary reason for many failures. Therefore, health literacy, as in other insights, helps feed information about health principles. Hypertension is one of the leading causes of death in The Bahamas. Prior trials to control hypertension were gaining minimal fruits until the introduction of health literacy. The people most affected with hypertension are males between ages 30-65. According to research on “sex difference in hypertension prevalence and control,” ⁶males were more prevalent in hypertension (34.6%) compared to females (30.8%).

This article shall review the literature on the relationship between health literacy and hypertension in males ages 30-65. It is a paper written due to a thorough literature search concerning this topic in The Bahamas. The review draws evidence from several articles and summarizes these articles’ findings displaying their conclusions, strengths, and weaknesses. We expect to draw inferences of reduced cases of hypertension as a result of health literacy. Our findings will serve as evidence that health literacy will reduce hypertension prevalence among males ages 30-65.

Literature Search

Identification of Publications

We chose multiple sources to review and took relevant information from those sources in analyzing this topic. This use of various sources was necessary because we wanted to compare different people’s findings to draw concrete conclusions—the literature comprised printed material supplemented by electronic data and online site searches. The amalgamation of the sources resulted in several citations from the fifteen references that we had. The review conducted included several materials from which we derived sufficient information on the topic. The fifteen literatures depict studies concerning the relationship between health literacy and the hypertension outcomes in males between the ages 30-65. However, some sources had additional information on the dependence of health literacy on sex differences and races.

Method

In the selection of the literature, we used Google scholar and derived other articles from Google books. We used keywords such as ‘health literacy’, knowledge’, ‘health outcomes’ and ‘hypertension’ to narrow down the search. The keywords then resulted in the multiple sources that we reviewed.

Literacy vs. Illiteracy

This study’s main aim is to compare the two conditions- literacy and illiteracy—relative to hypertension’s control in males. According to (Almas)¹⁵, only 3% of the people have literacy in hypertension: hence controlled it. The rest live by virtual data, and they are at risk of suffering the same.

Hypertension is growing to become a cause of alarm in The Bahamas and other countries. In The Bahamas, it is one of the leading death causes: of which the percentage decreases due to the public awareness of health literacy. Aubert argues that “lifestyle interventions also have the potential to reduce the need for or the number of medications in hypertensive and prevent high blood pressure from developing non-hypertensive.” ¹⁶ Unfortunately, middle-aged men tend to ignore the need for health literacy; hence they suffer victims of hypertension. However, with the increased campaign in support of literacy, we expect the number to reduce significantly. The attitude, beliefs and expected outcomes among the men hold the key to the prevalence of hypertension.

In many health institutions, there is a need to make crucial decisions before the conclusion of the best medical prescription, and this process of decision making calls for health literacy. The point of health literacy attacks not only the patients but also the health practitioners. In The Bahamas, a “low percentage of patients with low versus adequate literacy have controlled pressure”¹⁷. The low rate also applies to the practitioner because most colleges teach the nursing and treatment skills forgetting literacy skills. The study by Aboumatar shows that the overall rating of care did not differ based on health literacy and patients with low literacy reported low PDM scores than those with adequate literacy.¹⁷

Summary of Evidence

Most of the reviewed articles presented adequate evidence of the reliability of their information sources. Few presented little evidence, while some registered low-quality evidence due to invalid sources. A consistent measure of the literature revealed that it is prudent to validly scale the information while studying the affiliation between health literacy and hypertension in men ages 30-65.

Some multiple sources suggested that male “hypertension may be as a result of gene mutation.” ^18. This mutation tends towards being dormant until later ages: resulting in the rise of HTN at the age of 30. Most of those over the age of 65 could display tolerance; however, a good number succumbed to it. The death of the older men called for an emergent determination of a solution which landed on health literacy.

Summary of Results

In this case of the connection amid health literacy and hypertension in males ages 30-65, the results showed two overall outcomes. On the stronger side, it could reduce the rate of hypertension’s contraction while, on the other hand, it increased the speed. These two occasions seem ironic, but the sources displayed enough evidence to make the outcomes a reality. First, men who could spend a lot of time working and other life strains suffered because they ignored literacy. As suggested by the literature, “a small percentage (3%) had controlled hypertension.” ¹⁸ This small percentage is because of the ignorance and preoccupation of men.

Another piece of literature on sex differences in hypertension prevalence revealed a higher control rate of 51.3% in women than 44.8% in men ¹⁹. A review of the health literacy and results in hypertension by Zhou showed inconsistent evidence about health literacy. “The individual with low health knowledge is probable to have poor knowledge of hypertension.”⁷ This inference is accurate since lack of knowledge is directly proportional to action in any field, more so health. This ignorance also leads to the contraction of hypertension.

Summary of Findings

From the multiple sources, we drew several findings on health literacy outcomes in males between ages 30-65. The main point in the literature was that health literacy helps reduce the cases of hypertension in men. Many nurses and caretakers need knowledge for them to know how to handle hypertension. It is necessary for them to extensively study the preventive measures to generate proper ways of taking care of patients and educating others on keeping themselves safe from contraction.

In The Bahamas, infectious heart diseases were the most devastating, and hypertension is the leading killer disease among cardiovascular diseases. Health literacy indicates an individual’s ability to recognize and use the evidence to endorse and sustain a healthy life.⁷ The literacy educated men on lifestyle activities that reduce kept body organs such as the kidney from chronic diseases.

By logistic legislation conducted by McNaughton, “Out of the total subjects, 192 had low literacy, and 227 had uncontrolled blood pressure.” ²⁰. The revelation served as proof that low literacy is directly proportional to uncontrolled blood pressure. Halladay suggests that “there should be counseling to those with cardiovascular diseases” ²¹. The purpose of the counseling is to reduce depression and educate the patients on necessary measures. The illiterate population tends to ignore the necessary preventive and control measures hence higher chances of HTN contraction.

There were reviews on the level to which older people adhere to the self-care measures. Self-care is an initiative that came with health literacy to reduce overdependence on caretakers. The findings showed that “few older people under self-care were health literate;”²² hence most of them suffered from hypertension. Their ages ranged between 50 and 65; thus, they fall under our target population. Therefore, Son encouraged the education of these older adults concerning the control measures of hypertension.

The literature gave a concise conclusion that was meaningful to our research. Xia Li, one of the health practitioners, said that “education on hypertension should focus on marginal populations, such as married people or those who are illiterate.”²³ They had tried the system earlier, and it showed signs of efficiency. His suggestion came as a solution to the prominence of health illiteracy and subsequently increased cases of hypertension among males between 30 and 65.

On the other hand, literacy could lead to overconfidence since most people could stay with knowledge without application. Kim emphasized, “Men tended to bother other things until they forgot to apply their health literacy learning.”²⁴ The apparent result of this was increased cases of HTN. However, this limitation can be mitigated by public awareness and constant reminding.

Conclusion

The men in New Providence suffered the wrath of hypertension, and they were desperate for deliverance. Health literacy came at the right time to relieve these men of their distress as it enlightened all ethnic groups on how to conduct themselves and avoid the contraction of hypertension.¹⁴ However, as we have seen; health literacy came with one limitation of making the people overconfident. The cases of overconfidence should not cause alarm because there are suggestions on how to deal with them. Following these resolutions can be the best way of fighting against hypertension and other diseases. “Health literacy is the primary and secondary prevention of hypertension”.²⁵ They help the patient follow the guidelines of the doctor and their caretakers concerning healthy living. Hypertension’s high mortality rate could only decrease if everybody were ready to take preventive measures. Like all other problems, there is relief when we land at a solution. Besides, for this case, the only remaining plan is applying the answers because they look effective on paper. Therefore, it is advisable to create public awareness concerning health literacy’s effects and their outcomes when used in hypertension males between the ages of 30-65.