Investigation of health literacy and some related factors of 4th grade students in a university

Aim: The aim of the study was to examine the health literacy level and some related factors of the 4th grade students of a university. Methods: The universe of this cross-sectional type was consisted of 353 students who were educated in the departments of a university during spring semester of 2014-2015 academic years. 283 students were reached in the survey (80.1%). The data collection tool includes several socio-demographic characteristics of the participants, “Test of Functional Health Literacy in Adults” and some variables that were thought to be related to the health literacy. Data was evaluated using SPSS 23.0 statistical software. Descriptive statistics was used in the summary of the data, Chi-square and Mann Whitney-U tests were used in the intergroup comparisons and logistic regression model was used in the analyzes. Results: The ages of the participants ranged from 21 to 32 years with an average age of 23.1± 1.6 years and 61.0% were females. It has been identified as the average score of “Test of Functional Health Literacy in Adults” of the participants’ were 74.4±14.4 and 60.4% of them had sufficient health literacy level. There was no difference in health literacy scores based on the socio-demographic characteristics of the participants. According to the logistic regression model, the health literacy scores of health services users’ in the last six months were 1.7 times higher than those who did not use (95% CI=1.1-2.9). Conclusion: Health literacy levels of two out of every five participants were insufficient. This result was noteworthy when it’s thought that the working group was composed of university students. It is of great importance for providing educational programs to raise health awareness, health responsibilities and awareness in order to acquire, interpret and understand basic health information and services in the context of increasing the level of health literacy, especially focusing on youth, in the context of assessing health literacy levels