Health education kiosk for low-literacy patients served by community-based clinics

Health care providers and computer-based teaching systems seeking to address the health concerns of medically under-served, low literacy patients share similar challenges. These challenges include differing cultural beliefs, linguistic barriers, and variations in the predisposition to seek timely care. The effects of patient characteristics, such as race, ethnicity, income, education, place of residence and age, on health care are both independent and additive. The lack of access to culturally and linguistically acceptable information about health care magnifies the impact of poor health practices on this population. Using a four-stage development approach a Web-based kiosk system was created that delivers appropriate information on the health effects of smoking and cessation to low literacy Mexican Americans. Simplicity was verified as the key to good design. In addition, the kiosk is an appropriate way to collect data about a clinic population. Results show that there is a need for smoking awareness and cessation education among this population.