MedExplain Health

MedExplain Health promotes health equity by providing access to engaging, evidence-based, unbiased, and easily understood health information, allowing patients to be more active participants in their health care, reducing negative outcomes and disparities in care.

MedExplain Health was founded to build on and expand the Patient Activated Learning System (PALS), an evidence-based approach to patient education created by Dr. Monika Safford over the course of 10 years of health services research. The PALS methodology focuses on creating content that is trustworthy, easy to understand, and engaging by incorporating key aspects of adult learning theory. Content is uniquely designed to engage marginalized communities and those with low health literacy who suffer a disproportionate burden from chronic disease.

To date, this educational methodology has been used in numerous research projects demonstrating its superiority to more conventional patient education and its potential to improve outcomes. While conventional belief in the medical community is that patient education alone is not enough to influence outcomes, research has shown that this approach to education changes patient behavior. Since adherence to medical recommendations is especially challenging in low-income and marginalized communities, modalities that have the potential to change patient behavior stand to make a significant impact on disparities in health outcomes.

Using this methodology, MedExplain Health creates content in the form of articles, graphics, and videos that are freely available online. The organization is developing information technology solutions that integrate the library of health education content with electronic health records to allow for the delivery of relevant and timely content to patients at key moments in the clinical care process.