Results & Publications

In the M-POHL OHL project, two self-assessment tools were developed.

Results:

International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy of Hospitals - short version

  • International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy of Hospitals - short version (OHL-Hos-SF)

    The OHL-Hos-SF was developed by the M-POHL Working Group on Developing the OHL-Hos-SF, consisting of experts from 10 countries and involving hospital staff as “users of the tool”. The OHL-Hos-SF  has 8 standards (reflecting the OHL-Hos standards, but with revised wording, 19 sub-standards and 60 indicators (when including sub-indicators 72 items are used). The indicators for each sub-standard operationalize concrete observable or measurable elements. A factsheet on the OHL-Hos-SF can be found here. 

    The OHL-Hos-SF can be applied for under certain conditions, as specified in the application template. The application template is available here.
     

International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy in Primary Health Care Services.

  • International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy in Primary Health Care Services (OHL-PHC) 

    The OHL-PHC was developed by the M-POHL Working Group on Organizational Health Literacy in Primary Health Care Service consisting of experts from 13 countries. The tool builds on the OHL-Hos and the OHL Self-AsseT (De Gani et al. 2020).  It has 7 standards, 19 sub-standards and 51 indicators (when including sub-indicators 70 items are used). The indicators for each sub-standard operationalize concrete observable or measurable elements. The tool is applicable at any type of organization that offers primary care, such as primary care centers, offices of generalist health professionals, ambulatory health care centers, family planning centers and pharmacies. A factsheet on the OHL-PHC can be found here.

    The OHL-PHC can be applied for under certain conditions, as specified in the application template. The application template is available here.

Both tools are available as word and excel documents. Word versions provide detailed introductions, excel versions enable the automatic creation of result overviews in percentage and as graphs. Supporting tools for summing up results from individual assessment and enable the visualization of results by creating automatic graphs were created.

 

The International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy (Responsiveness) of Hospitals (OHL-Hos) was developed by the International Working Group on Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Literate Healthcare Organizations. In 2022, this work was taken up by the WHO Action Network on Measuring Population and Organizational Health Literacy (M-POHL), and the OHL-Hos was slightly updated (version 1.3). The OHL-Hos has since been translated, culturally adapted, and piloted in six European countries. A paper describing the experiences of piloting the OHL-Hos in these countries is available here.

The OHL-Hos has since been shared with various countries and translated and culturally adapted to different national contexts. The currently available language versions are provided below.

Brazilian Version

Publications:

  • Dietscher, Christina; Straßmayr, Christa; Gugglberger, Lisa; Eder, Julia; Schütze, Denise (2026): Organizational health literacy in Austria—policy developments and results from a pilot assessment in primary care. Frontiers in public health 14/: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2026.1802212
  • Lorini, C.; Palmieri, L.; Unim, B.; Zimmitti, S.; Lunetta, C.; Biagi, C.; Toccafondi, F.; Zanobini, P.; Iadevaia, S.; Cacciuttolo, M. G.; Lombardo, C.; Marcozzi, B.; Ancona, A.; Paladini, A.; Galeone, D.; Specchia, M. L.; Bonaccorsi, G. (2025): Insights into organizational health literacy in Italian hospitals: findings from the M-POHL network project. In: Health Promot Int 40/4: https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/daaf137
  • Straßmayr, C.; Finbraten, H. S.; Bitzer, E. M.; Bonaccorsi, G.; Cacciuttolo, M. G.; Dudra, J.; Guttersrud, O.; Islertas, Z.; Jeitani, C.; Krajnovic, D.; Le, C.; Levin-Zamir, D.; Lombardo, C.; Lorini, C.; Marcozzi, B.; Palmieri, L.; Schutze, D.; Specchia, M. L.; Steflova, A.; Stevic, I.; Struk, P.; Unim, B.; Van den Broucke, S.; Zanobini, P. (2025): Assessing organizational health literacy in hospitals by using the International Self-Assessment Tool for Organizational Health Literacy of Hospitals - a feasibility study in six European countries. In: BMC Health Serv Res 25/1:1265:https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-025-13367-4  

Participating countries are encouraged to publish their national results of the OHL project. In the final phase of the project, an International Report will be produced.

Norway


National Report of the piloting of the OHL-Hos in Norway

The Norwegian team has published a national report on their piloting experience with the OHL-hos tool. The report is in Norwegian with an English summary on page 5 – 6.

  • Brach, C., Keller, D., Hernandez, L. M., Baur, C., Parker, R., Dreyer, B., Schyve, P., Lemerise, A.J. and Schillinger, D. (2012) 'Ten Attributes of Health Literate Health Care Organizations' Washington DC: Institute of Medicine of the National Académies.
  • Brach, C. (2017) 'The Journey to Become a Health Literate Organization: A Snapshot of Health System Improvement' Stud Health Technol Inform, 240, pp. 203–237.
  • DeGani, S., Nowak-Flück, D., Nicca, D. and Vogt D. (2020) 'Self-Assessment Tool to Promote Organizational Health Literacy in Primary Care Settings in Switzerland' International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17249497.
  • Dietscher, C. and Pelikan, J.M. (2017) ‘Health-literate hospitals and healthcare organizations. Results from an Austrian feasibility study on the self-assessment of organizational health literacy in hospitals’ in Schaeffer, D. and Pelikan J.M. (eds.) Health Literacy, Forschungsstand und Perspektiven, Bern: Hogrefe, pp. 303-313.
  • Farmanova, E., Bonneville, L. and Bouchard, L. (2018) 'Organizational Health Literacy: Review of Theories, Frameworks, Guides, and Implementation Issues' Inquiry, 55. doi:10.1177/0046958018757848.
  • Henrard, G., Vanmeerbeek, M., Buret, L. and Rademakers, J (2019): Dealing with health literacy at the organisational level, French translation and adaptation of the Vienna health literate organisation self-assessment tool. BMC Health Services Research, 19 (146). doi:10.1186/s12913-019-3955-y.
  • International Working Group Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Literate Healthcare Organizations (Working Group HPH & HLO) (2019) 'International Self-Assessment Tool Organizational Health Literacy (Responsiveness) for Hospitals - SAT-OHL-Hos-v1.3-EN-international (updated 2023). Vienna: WHO Collaborating Centre for Health Promotion in Hospitals and Healthcare (CC-HPH).
  • Kickbusch I., Pelikan, J. M., Apfel, F., and Tsouros, A. D. (2013) Health literacy. The solid facts. Copenhagen: WHO Regional Office for Europe.
  • Pelikan, J.M. (2019) ‘Health-literate healthcare organizations’ in Okan, O., Bauer, U., Levin-Zamir, D. and Sorensen, K. (eds.) International Handbook of Health Literacy – Research, Practice and Policy across the Life-Span. Policy Press, pp. 539-554.
  • Trezona, A., Dodson, S. and Osborne, R.H. (2017) 'Development of the organisational health literacy responsiveness (Org-HLR) framework in collaboration with health and social services professionals' BMC Health Services Research,18 (694).
  • Trezona, A., Dodson, S., Fitzsimon, E., LaMontagne, A. D. and Osborne R. H. (2020) 'Field-Testing and Refinement of the Organisational Health Literacy Responsiveness Self-Assessment (Org-HLR) Tool and Process. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2020, 17 (1000). doi:10.3390/ijerph17031000.

Back to Overview Organizational Health Literacy (OHL).