SURVEY SHOWS GALWAY HAS SHOCKING LITERACY PROBLEMS

Date Published: 26-Oct-2007

Literacy issues are impacting heavily on our health and well-being- thats according to a new survey that is being launched today. 7 out of 10 people in the West of Ireland do not understand the medical term 'prognosis', a word which is commonly used by doctors when forcasting the condition of patients.Nearly half the people surveyed said they would only sometimes ask for an explaination if they did not understand a medical term.Ciara O Rourke of the Pharmaceutical Company Merck, Sharp and Dohme, who commissioned the survey, says the statistics are worrying