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HEALTH LITERACY OF POOR PEOPLE IN SOUTH BOHEMIAN REGION

Z. Rimnacova, A. Kajanova

Abstract

The submitted paper deals with a specific target group of citizens living below poverty line in South Bohemian Region and it is a part of Project RVO: ZGO2016_001 „Health literacy of selected groups of population of South Bohemian Region“. The project is further focused on several target groups, including children and adolescents, adults, seniors and the Roma. The poverty line for households in the Czech Republic is calculated as the proportion of total net monthly income of the household and the sum of consumption units (as determined by the OECD scale), and the difference is compared to the 60 % median of equalized income. Persons are endangered by income poverty if the relative income of the household in which they live does not achieve that value. Last year, that line for individuals was about 10 500,- (about 389 €). The concept of health must be understood as a comprehensive concept consisting of a number of factors that have effect on the individual at all levels. Therefore the study focuses on comparing the health literacy in relation to social, cultural or gender differences of the inhabitants of the Czech Republic. The pilot study carried out in 2015 showed that the Czech Republic lags behind Austria, Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands and Poland in all components of health literacy. The main goal of the study consists in ascertaining how well this group is informed about health care. Another goal consists in ascertaining how they are informed about the issues of health and illness, prevention, and how they get information about health. We ascertained what skills and knowledge are applied by the above stated group of citizens when caring for their health. We acquired the information through a standardized questionnaire, divided into three areas: the first concerns health support, the second concerns prevention of illnesses and the last concerns health care. The general purpose of the study consists in defining the basic spectrum of competences in the area of care for their health for citizens living below poverty line. The final number of respondents with income below poverty line will be 300. The interim results of the group of citizens living below poverty line show that most of the respondents do understand the messages of the physicians; they deal with the information on health problems and potential prevention within their natural social networks. The respondents have little information about the opportunities of free use of health care and of the use of insurance. After assembling all results, proposals for improvement of the level of health literacy in this selected group will be developed.

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DOI resolver: doi.org/10.5593/SGEMSOCIAL2017/HB31/S13.061

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