[Health literacy and its association with the control of hypertension].

Abstract

Background: Health literacy (HL) involves self-care skills of healthy people and those with chronic diseases.

Objective: To assess the association between HL and blood pressure (BP) control in patients with hypertension.

Material and methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted from April to June 2022 in a family medicine unit from the Mexican Institute for Social Security (IMSS). This survey included 349 adults of 18 years of age or older with hypertension diagnosis and antihypertensive pharmacological treatment. HL was measured with the European Health Literacy Survey HLS-EU-Q12M, validated in Mexico. The characteristics of participants with and without BP control were compared with chi-square. Multiple Poisson regression was applied to assess the association between HL and BP control, and it was controlled based on the clinically important covariates.

Results: 60.2% of patients with hypertension had BP controlled; 23.8% had inadequate HL, 44.4% problematic HL, and 31.8% sufficient HL. Sufficient HL was associated with BP control only in patients with high school or higher education (adjusted prevalence ratio 2.18, 95% confidence interval 1.16-4.08).

Conclusions: Only 60% of hypertensive patients achieve control of their BP. Sufficient HL is associated with greater likelihood of BP control in patients with high school or higher education.