Table 1 Characteristics of the included studies
| Â | First author, year, country | Healthcare provider | Patients | Setting/aim | Study design | Face-to-face - and/or written & online strategies/toolsa | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Ache, 2009, USA [46] | Healthcare providers in general/not specified | Patients with low-literacy in palliative and end of life care | Internet websites of 5 nationally prominent US-based palliative care organisations were searched. A convenience sample of 15 patient education materials per palliative care organization was drawn (n = 75). | Review of patient information materials from the internet | Written & online strategies | – |
2 | Chou, 2015, USA [19] | Healthcare providers in general/not specified | Patients with limited health literacy in palliative care | Using a multilevel ecological framework to highlight connections between health literacy and palliative care across a wide variety of health areas, including: palliative care utilization; communication between providers, patients and other caregivers; self-care and caregiving outside the clinical setting | Overview of available strategies and tools to address health literacy in palliative care, derived from previous studies (Book chapter; no information about numbers of patients/ providers/ materials included) | Face-to-face, written & online strategies and tools | Also strategies and tools at patient, organizational, community and national policy level |
3 | Fage-Butler, 2015, USA [47] | Healthcare providers in general/ not specified | Patient and family centred care, with a focus on health literacy in palliative care | Three types of written & online palliative care communication were described: one-to one: provider responds to needs of individual patient (email); one-to-many: provider communicates to a group (end-of-life leaflets); many-to-many: a bank of providers share advice or responses to a group (online patient forums) | Overview of available written and online strategies to support the needs of palliative care patients, derived from previous studies (Book chapter; no information about numbers of patients/ providers/ materials included) | Written & online strategies | – |
4 | Kidd, 2014, New Zealand [45] | Healthcare providers in primary and specialist care. Also formal and informal community care providers | Maori patients and their extended family in palliative care, with a focus on health literacy | To understand health literacy in palliative care for Maori, their clinicians and community delivery of these services | Qualitative study based on interviews (n = 21 patients in palliative specialist care and their extended family; n = 6 providers/key informants); focus groups (n = 54 health professionals from different disciplines); written resource analysis (n = 42 written resources from participating palliative care providers); literature review (n = 27 articles included, most qualitative studies) | Face-to-face, written & online strategies | – |
5 | Rawlings, 2015, Australia [44] | Healthcare providers in general, focus on nurses | Patients with limited health literacy in palliative care | Australian website (CareSearch) for palliative care patients and providers, with evidence based, easy to read and understand information. | Clinical update & case study (review of CareSearch website) in palliative care (no information about numbers of patients/ providers/ materials included) | Face-to-face, written & online strategies | Also strategies at patient and organizational level |