MEDICINES AND ME: HANDS-ON HEALTH LITERACY LESSONS FOR ADOLESCENTS

• Published in: Journal of adolescent health Vol. 66; no. 2S; p. S69
• Main Authors: Alcena-Stiner, Danielle, Holt, Susan, Montes, Guillermo, Markowitz, Dina
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Elsevier BV 01-02-2020
• Subjects: Adolescents; Classrooms; Conceptual development; Drugs; Hands; Health literacy; Intervention; Lesson plans; Over the counter sales; Prone; Quantitative psychology; Reliability; Secondary schools; Side effects; Teachers; Teenagers; Test scores
• ISSN: 1054-139X; 1879-1972

Purpose: Adolescents are prone to errors in self-administering medicines, and they have serious misunderstandings about potential risks or adverse effects of over-the-counter (OTC) medicines. This project created six hands-on lessons for use by secondary school teachers to increase their students' understanding of the safe use of OTC medicines, with focus on how to safely administer the correct dose of medicine, and how medicines are developed and tested. Methods: Six distinct outcome measures were created, consisting of a multiple choice test closely aligned with core lesson concepts. The development of lesson measures involved two rounds of pilot testing, with five teachers participating in each round, followed by a round of field testing with ten teachers per lesson. Pilot/field testing was carried out in classrooms across the United States. Teachers administered the test immediately before (pre) and immediately after (post) their students participated in the lesson. Data collected from the measures were rigorously analyzed using established methods for overall reliability and psychometric properties. Additionally, teachers completed a survey to provide feedback on the appropriateness of the lessons and test questions and provided suggestions for improvement. Results: The developed lessons increased students' pre to post test scores (21.01 to 124.09 scaled score). The Cohen's d effects ranged from a small intervention effect (d=0.26, p<0.001) to a large intervention effect ((1=1.99, p<0.001). Conclusions: All six lessons improved pre to post test scores among adolescents. The developed lessons substantially and significantly increase adolescents' understanding of the safe use of OTC medicines.