(Reposted with permission)

Jan Berger, MD, MJ, is the Chief Medical Officer at Silverlink Communications. She leads Silverlink’s population health initiatives in areas such as adherence, clinical messaging, engagement and health behavior change. Dr. Berger also is active on numerous national committees on quality and is the Editor in Chief of the American Journal of Pharmacy Benefit.  In all these roles, Dr. Berger is passionate that communications can significantly improve health outcomes.

In this latest podcast from Helen Osborne interviews Jeanette Courtad DDS, a practicing dentist. Dr. Courtad has worked with patients of all ages—from outreach programs at primary schools to now being the dentist at the Colorado School of Mines Student Health Center.

Dr. Courtad is also an artist with a lifetime of experience painting, dancing, and sculpting. She combines her artistic talents with a passion for educating children about the need for better oral hygiene in her new book, Toothful Tales: How We Survived the Sweet Attack.

Dr. Ruth Parker is Professor of Medicine and Public Health at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. She is nationally recognized for her efforts in health literacy research, education, and health policy.

Dr. Parker’s accomplishments are many, including helping to develop the TOFHLA (Test of Functional Health Literacy in Adults) and co-writing the health literacy definition included in many publications and initiatives including the U.S. Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (otherwise known as “Health Care Reform”).

One best practice for improving health literacy is to use plain language. Plainlanguage.gov describes plain language as "communication your audience can understand the first time they read or hear it". Written material is in plain language if your audience can: