Adults Living with Limited Literacy and Chronic Illness: Patient Education Experiences

The purpose of this study was to investigate how Canadian adults living with limited literacy and chronic illness made meaning of their patient education experiences. The study used a hermeneutic phenomenological research design and employed three data sources over a nine-month period. Data was interpreted and analyzed as it was collected, following common procedures for phenomenological studies. Five themes emerged from the data: roles and relationships, language and health care interactions, living between worlds, mismatched expectations, and powerlessness. Findings suggest that the participants transformed their understanding of their patient education experiences because their literacy abilities improved through work in their literacy classrooms. The article closes with a discussion of the implications of the study for adult literacy practitioners and policy makers. (Contains 1 figure.)