Do written education materials that use content and design principles improve older people's knowledge?

Background/Aim:  Information may inform and empower clients to engage in their health care. Information can be provided in written form, but it is only effective if it can be read and understood by clients. This study examined whether the knowledge acquisition of participants aged 65 years and older improved more after reading leaflets revised according to content and design principles compared to the leaflets in their original form.
Methods:  Seven participant pairs (mean age was 74 years, 79% were women), matched according to reading ability, read either the original or the revised versions of four leaflets used by occupational therapists with older clients. Knowledge before and after reading the leaflets was measured using true/false tests developed for each leaflet.
Results:  After adjusting for differences in baseline knowledge scores, participants who read the revised leaflets acquired 55.3% more knowledge than those who read the original leaflets. All but one participant preferred the revised versions of the leaflets.
Conclusions:  Simply written and clearly presented written education materials may improve clients' understanding of the content. Further research is needed to determine if one or a combination of the content and design principles used to revise the leaflets is effective in increasing clients' knowledge.