A recent study by Wong and colleagues from
the Boston University Medical Center found that current laryngectomy-related
patient education materials are too difficult for an average American adult to
understand.
The authors evaluated
laryngectomy-related educational materials from an online search using the
validated Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool, calculated reading difficulty,
and assessed the correlation between readability, understand-ability, and action
ability.
The authors concluded that current
laryngectomy-related patient education materials are highly variable in
understandability and action ability, and reading difficulty across all
formulas also exceeded the eighth-grade reading level of an average American
adult.They suggested that future
revisions of laryngectomy-related educational materials may be warranted in
order for current materials to benefit a wider readership.
