Health Literacy in Africa—A Scoping Review of Scientific Publications

Kristine Sørensen (), Verena Knoll, Neida Ramos, Millicent Boateng, Guda Alemayehu, Laura Schamberger and Stefanie Harsch
Additional contact information
Kristine Sørensen: Global Health Literacy Academy, 8240 Risskov, Denmark
Verena Knoll: Pharmacoeconomics Departments, Austrian National Public Health Institute, 1010 Vienna, Austria
Neida Ramos: Institute of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Nova University of Lisbon, 1249-008 Lisbon, Portugal
Millicent Boateng: Ensign Global College, Akosombo 136, Ghana
Guda Alemayehu: University of South Africa, Pretoria 0003, South Africa
Laura Schamberger: Management Centre Innsbruck, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Stefanie Harsch: Center for Medicine and Society, University of Freiburg, 79098 Freiburg, Germany

IJERPH, 2024, vol. 21, issue 11, 1-15

Abstract: Africa’s health landscape is rapidly changing, requiring new solutions such as a focus on health literacy. However, there is currently a limited overview of the development and application of health literacy in African countries and societies. This scoping review aims to analyze scientific publications on health literacy in Africa with regards to research approaches, historical developments, geographic origins, target populations and settings, and topical interests. The research followed Arksey and O’Malley six steps of scoping reviews and employed the Joanna Briggs Institute’s PCC method for search string formulation and the PRISMA-SCR checklist for reporting. On 11 July 2022, the following six databases were searched for scientific articles including included reports, policy briefs, book chapters, and research publications: PubMed, PsycINFO, Cochrane Library, ERIC, African Journals Online, and African Index Medicus. A total of 336 articles were identified. The research team co-developed a codebook and three researchers independently extracted data. The analysis provided the most comprehensive overview of the current scope and scale of health literacy in Africa to date. The publications represented 37 of the 54 African Union countries and dated back to 2001, although most were published in the last decade. The content analysis identified 13 broad themes, including mental health, communicable diseases, non-communicable diseases, maternal health, digital health, information and communication, health care, prevention and health promotion, conceptual perspectives, cultural perspectives, and outcomes and measurement. The analysis of target groups revealed a wide range of actors involved in different settings, mostly in health care or community settings. These comprehensive and novel findings can be used to prioritize future actions for public and professional capacity building, policy development, and improved practice to improve health literacy for all in Africa.

Keywords: health literacy; Africa; African Union; scoping review (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/21/11/1456/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/21/11/1456/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:21:y:2024:i:11:p:1456-:d:1511697

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().