Your office is a literacy-rich environment filled with signs, postings, informational booklets, magazines, and forms. You expect your patients to be able to understand the signs, complete forms, and otherwise comprehend the information available to them in order to successfully navigate their dental appointment. Their ability to do this is a part of their individual oral health literacy, which the American Dental Association defines as the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate oral health decisions.

An individual's oral health literacy can be impacted by the literacy demands and expectations of the dental office. A project initiated by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health created an in-depth exploration of the health literacy environment of hospitals and health facilities and proposed methods for assessment and improvement. As a part of the project, a packet of simple "starter" exercises was created to assist in the assessment of the health literacy environment.

These exercises can help your office consider some of the characteristics of your environment that help or hinder a patient's ability to navigate an appointment. To download the packet, please visit https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/135/2012/09/activitypacket.pdf.