You Can’t Tell By Looking!
Assessing A Patient’s Ability to Read &
Understand Health Information
The word "testing" can have different meanings and can elicit many different feelings depending on one’s perspective. Archie Willard, an adult learner, who first learned to read when he was 54, gives us a sense of what testing means to those with limited literacy.
“ As a dyslexic and an adult learner with reading problems, I speak for many other adult learners. We hate having to take written literacy tests. People with other kinds of handicaps are not continually asked to expose their weaknesses to whatever degree they are handicapped. There is no physical pain in taking a written test, but when we have to take a written test there is a lot of frustration inside each of us. We grew up feeling humiliated because we had poor literacy skills and now we are adults. Written tests are seen as another step backward for us and it turns us away.”
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