Factors Associated with Health Literacy for Public Health Students

Introduction: Health literacy is a necessary skill for a future workforce who will be a healthcare model for patients and even people around them. This will enhance knowledge of people to engage in the prevention of diseases and health risk factors, especially supporting people to modify their health behaviour. Aim: To investigate the factors associated with Health Literacy for Public Health Students. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive research involved 143 students from Sirindhorn College of Public Health, Praboromarajchanok Institute, Ministry of Public Health, Thailand. The data was collected from August to November, 2019 using a questionnaire, which was tested for content validity by 3 experts and its reliability was assessed using Cronbach's alpha. The critical thinking and health literacy yielded a score of 0.75 and 0.96, respectively. The data was analysed using descriptive statistics and multiple logistics regression at 0.05 level of significance, the adjusted odds ratio, 95% confidence Interval and p-value. Results: It was found that 109 (76.22%) of the respondents were female, the average age was 23.39 +/- 4.15 years, and 57 (39.86%) had a Grade Point Average (GPA) 3.00 from 4.00. The critical thinking and health literacy was classified as high level at 18 (12.59%) and 78 (54.55%), respectively. The factors significantly associated with reported high health literacy (p-value <0.05) were: (1) Gender (Adjusted OR=3.11, 95% CI: 1.28-7.58; p-value=0.012); (2) GPA (Adjusted OR=2.41, 95% CI: 1.15-5.04; p-value=0.019); and (3) Critical thinking (Adjusted OR= 2.99, 95 % CI: 1.36-6.54; p-value=0.006). Conclusion: The factors associated with high health literacy were: gender, GPA and student's critical thinking. Therefore, the stakeholders or policy makers should be concerned with ensuring students improve their learning and encourage them to gain a higher level of health literacy for a sustainable healthcare professional career.