Psychometric Validation of the Korean Version of the Heart Failure-Specific Health Literacy Scale.

Background and purpose: The goals of heart failure (HF) management include lowering adverse outcomes through optimal self-care. Health literacy has a significant role in ensuring optimal and effective HF self-care. Unfortunately, the proportion of low health literacy in HF patients is higher than those with other chronic diseases as well as the general population. Thus, healthcare providers need to screen HF patients. The HF-Specific Health Literacy Scale is a specific questionnaire to screen the health literacy in HF patients; however, the Korean version has not yet been validated. The study aimed to investigate the reliability and validity of the Korean version of the HF-Specific Health Literacy Scale.

Methods: We adopted a cross-sectional study design with 386 outpatients with chronic HF from a tertiary care hospital in Cheonan, South Korea. Data were collected from April to December 2020.

Results: The exploratory factor analysis revealed a three-factor (functional, communicative, and critical health literacy) 12-item structure of the scale. The result of the confirmatory factor analysis confirmed a good statistical fit for the data. The Korean version of the tool demonstrated satisfactory convergent and discriminant validity. The criterion validity analysis revealed significant correlation with general health literacy and knowledge about HF. The Korean version of the tool for 12 items had adequate overall internal consistency.

Implications for practice: The Korean version of the HF-Specific tool can be easily utilized for assessing health literacy level for HF patient education. Moreover, the tool can help healthcare providers develop strategies for promoting HF patients' health literacy.