Social Literacy: Nurses' Contribution Toward the Co-Production of Self-Management

Leslie Dubbin; Nancy Burke; Mark Fleming; Ariana Thompson-Lastad; Tessa M Napoles; Irene Yen; Janet K Shim

doi:10.1177/2333393621993451

Social Literacy: Nurses' Contribution Toward the Co-Production of Self-Management

Glob Qual Nurs Res. 2021 Feb 11:8:2333393621993451. doi: 10.1177/2333393621993451. eCollection 2021 Jan-Dec.

Authors

Leslie Dubbin¹, Nancy Burke^{1

2}, Mark Fleming¹, Ariana Thompson-Lastad¹, Tessa M Napoles¹, Irene Yen², Janet K Shim¹

Affiliations

¹ University of California, San Francisco, USA.
² University of California, Merced, USA.

Abstract

We share findings from a larger ethnographic study of two urban complex care management programs in the Western United States. The data presented stem from in-depth interviews conducted with 17 complex care management RNs and participant observations of home visits. We advance the concept of social literacy as a nursing attribute that comprises an RN's recognition and responses to the varied types of hinderances to self-management with which patients must contend in their lived environment. It is through social literacy that complex care management RNs reconceptualize and understand health literacy to be a product born out of the social circumstances in which patients live and the stratified nature of the health care systems that provide them care. Social literacy provides a broader framework for health literacy-one that is situated within the patient's social context through which complex care management RNs must navigate for self-management goals to be achieved.

Keywords: Western United States; chronic disease; complex care management; health inequalities; nursing.

Abstract

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