Health literacy measures the ability to comprehend, evaluate, and negotiate the data to make informed healthcare decisions. Although we tend to think of health literacy as central to societal concerns, numeracy crosses both professional and patient populations. For example, peer-reviewed clinical research often discusses risk-benefit analyses without the clarification that “risk” is defined as both benefits and harms. How do we calculate the harms of treatment to arrive at an informed clinical decision central to the patient’s best interests, values, and wishes?
Improving Numeracy in Medicine