Investigation on current health literacy among military personnel on plateau and analysis of influencing factors

Abstract

Objective To investigate the status quo of health literacy among military personnel stationing on plateau and analyze its influencing factors. Methods National Health Literacy Monitoring Questionnaire (2015), self-made questionnaire for demographic data based on literature, Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, Simplified Coping Style Questionnaire, and Positive and Negative Affect Scale were employed to survey 2 516 officers and soldiers stationing on plateau with aid of a WeChat APP Questionnaire Star. Their current status of health literacy and its influencing factors were analyzed. Results The survey results showed that the overall health literacy level was 20.03% among the 2 516 participants. The literacy levels of basic knowledge and concepts, healthy lifestyles and behaviors, and health skills were 31.08%, 26.23%, and 26.63%, respectively, and the health literacy levels of scientific health concepts, infectious disease prevention and treatment, chronic disease prevention and treatment, safety and first aid, basic medical care, and health information were 40.58%, 19.36%, 9.62%, 82.75%, 29.61%, and 45.03%, respectively. Multivariate unconditional logistic regression analysis indicated that the influencing factors of health literacy level were years of working (OR=1.857, 95%CI: 1.391~2.479; OR=4.657, 95%CI: 3.297~6.578), ethnicity (OR=0.394, 95%CI: 0.251~0.620), marriage (OR=0.609, 95%CI: 0.430~0.861), only-child family (OR=0.759, 95%CI: 0.585~0.985), home location (OR=0.545, 95%CI: 0.359~0.827), smoking (OR=1.579, 95%CI: 1.254~1.988), education level (OR=3.638, 95%CI: 1.500~8.822), weekly online game time (OR=0.517, 95%CI: 0.365~0.731; OR=0.351, 95%CI: 0.172~0.716), number of physical checkups per year (OR=3.251, 95%CI: 1.359~7.778; OR= 4.545, 95%CI: 1.841~11.221), father's occupation (OR=5.185, 95%CI: 1.800~14.933; OR=3.229, 95%CI: 1.261~8.270), mother's occupation (OR=0.221, 95%CI: 0.086~0.568; OR=0.218, 95%CI: 0.081~0.587; OR=0.046, 95%CI: 0.018~0.118), positive coping (OR=1.052, 95%CI: 1.033~1.072), and negative coping (OR=0.950, 95%CI: 0.929~0.972). Conclusion The overall health literacy level is quite low among the plateau military personnel in this ministry, and the relevant departments should actively explore effective interventions to comprehensively improve their health literacy based on the influencing factors.

Keywords

• plateau
• health literacy
• survey of current situation
• influencing factor