CHARGES

• Develop strategies to assist healthcare providers in patient education design and implementation.
  
  
• Encourage joint projects between other Collaborative Governance Committees.
  
  
• Disseminate patient education information and activities to the larger MGH community.
  
  
• Collaborate with Center for Professional Development to develop patient education programs to benefit PCS staff.
  
  
• Participate in JCAHO task force to promote interdisciplinary education tools.
  
  
• Recommend systems and technology to support the cataloging, dissemination, documentation and evaluation of patient education activities and materials.
  
  
• Assure activities and materials reflect diversity of the population served.

• Meeting Schedule



• Members



• Contact Us

• 2007 Goals & Accomplishments



• 2008 Goals



• A Survey of Patient Education: Current Practice, Future Direction
  Power Point slides & Poster



• Articles, Presentations,
  Conferences and Collaborations

Below are the links to Massachusetts General Hospital's guidelines surrounding patient and family education. (MGH Internal Access Only)

• Trove Library



• Nursing Procedure Manual: Patient and Family Education



• Nursing Procedure Manual: A Nursing Practice Guide



• Patient Education Competency Packet

• Partners Handbook: Partners Patient Education Information



• Clinical Pathways
  Access to MGH produced patient education discharge documents on a variety of topics from anticoagulation to vascular surgery.
  
  
• CareNotes
  Customizable documentation system that is available to clinicians for patient education.
  
  
• MGH Patient Education Television Channel
  
  
• PCOI
  General Internal Medicine and Pediatrics clinical and educational resources/information.
  
  
• MGH Tobacco Treatment Service
  MGH Service helping smokers become nonsmokers.
  
  
• Treadwell Library
  Links to patient education and consumer health information.
  
  
• Blum Patient and Family Learning Center
  Learn about health and illness.
  
  
• Cancer Resource Room
  Learn about cancer.
  
  
• Lexi-Comp
  Click on Patient Care to access drug and procedure patient education information.



• Access to Resources for Community Health
  High-quality community-based health information.
  
  
• Virtual Diabetes Center
  Reliable diabetes patient education information in one place.
  
  
• MedlinePlus
  Health information from the National Library of Medicine.
  
  
• eMedicine
  More than 650 patient education topics.
  
  
• AAFP Conditions A to Z
  Patient information from the American Academy of Family Physicians.
  
  
• Healthcare Advice for Children, Teens and Parents
  Information for parents and caregivers from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

• Patient and Family Learning Center: How to evaluate a health website



• MedlinePlus: Evaluating a health website



• Medical Library Association: Evaluating a health website



• Media Evaluation Tool



• Media Evaluation Instructions

Health Literacy refers to a person's ability to read, understand and use healthcare information. The Patient Education Committee is committed to providing patients with educational materials that are easy to read and understand.

October is Health Literacy Month. Traditionally the committee hosts an informational hallway display and/or writes articles in the area of health literacy regarding patient education. Check back often to see what new things the committee is doing in the exciting field of health literacy.

The following are great links reviewed by the committee to help you understand health literacy and to write materials in plain language.

• Treadwell Library: A collection of plain language/health literacy



• National Cancer Institute: Clear and Simple: Developing Effective Print Materials for Low-Literate Readers



• Fry Readability Formula: A quick and easy way to determine at what reading level your material is written.



• Harvard School of Public Health full text of the book "Teaching Patients with Low Literacy Skills" available online for free.



• Health Literacy Consulting helps individuals and organizations communicate health information in ways patients, families, and employees can understand



• National Institutes of Health website dedicated to improving health liveracy. Click here to learn about the importance of health literacy for health professionals.