Investigation of the effect of HEALTH literacy levels of hypertension patients on adherence to treatment

A descriptive study was conducted with 80 patients who applied to the cardiology outpatient clinic of Çukurova University Balcalı Training and Research Hospital and agreed to participate in the study in order to examine the effects of the health literacy levels of hypertension patients on adherence to treatment. Necessary permissions were obtained before the study. "Socio-Demographical Characteristics" questionnaire, "Adult Health Literacy Scale" and "Modified Morsky Scale" were used to collect data. The conformity of the data to the normal distribution was tested with the Shaphiro Wilk test. Mann Whitney U test was used to compare non-normally distributed scale scores at the levels of two-category variables, and Kruskal Wallis and Dunn multiple comparison tests were used for variables with more than two categories. Relationships between non-normally distributed scales were evaluated with the Spearman rank correlation coefficient. The mean age of the individuals participating in the study was 62.45±11.95 years, 58.8% were women, and 21.3% were illiterate. The motivation level of 20% of the patients and the level of knowledge of 18.8% were found to be low. The average adult health literacy scale score is 11.51 ± 5.21. A weak positive correlation was found between the adult health literacy scale score and the Morisky total score (r=0.338, P=0.002), and a moderately significant positive correlation was found between the Morisky knowledge level score (r=0.447, P=0.001).On the other hand, no significant correlation was found between adult health literacy scale score and Morisky motivation score (r=0.011, P=0.923). Between adult health literacy scale scores and Age, there was a negative correlation between moderate severity (r=-0.430, P=0.001), SBP (r=0.316, P=0.004), DBP (r=0.340, P=0.002), and a weak and positive correlation. correlations were detected. As a result; Hypertension patients are non-adherent to treatment, their health literacy level is low, and as the health literacy level increases in adult individuals, treatment compliance increases weakly, but treatment knowledge level and treatment motivation increase significantly. It is a group of health professional nurses who are in close relationship with the patient. In this direction, patient education should be approached with a nurse-oriented approach and training protocols should be determined.