Abstract:
Objective: The objective of this review is to map the details of school-based interventions used to improve health
literacy of senior high school students.
Introduction: The global prevalence of poor adult health literacy is caused, in part, by limited health education in
secondary schools. Enhancing adolescent health literacy could potentially improve adult health literacy, health
behavior, and health outcomes.
Inclusion criteria: Studies investigating school-based interventions to improve health literacy of senior high school
students, regardless of design, characteristics, and assessment tools, will be eligible for inclusion. Studies that provide
combined data (senior high school students mixed with other students) or have a compulsory component outside of
school will be excluded.
Methods: MEDLINE (Ovid), Embase (Ovid), ProQuest Education Journals, Education Research Complete, SAGE
Journals, and Index New Zealand will be searched for journal articles published in English since 1998. Two
independent reviewers will screen titles and abstracts for eligibility, retrieve potentially relevant papers in full,
and extract data from included studies. A third reviewer will resolve any disagreements. Quantitative analysis (eg,
frequency analysis) will indicate: geographic region of studies, design and targeted population (school grade of
study participants); the mode of delivery (extracurricular or during school hours, implemented by teachers or
other professionals), duration, and health literacy model and domain of the interventions. Descriptive qualitative
content analysis will be used to summarize, code and classify key characteristics of the interventions (eg, teaching
models and strategies, content, and related skills) and main outcomes related to health literacy into meaningful
categories.
