Numeracy, Health Literacy, Cognition, and 30-Day Readmissions among Patients with Heart Failure

BACKGROUND Numeracy, health literacy, and cognition are important for chronic disease management. Prior studies have found them to be associated with poorer self-care and worse clinical outcomes, but limited data exists in the context of heart failure (HF), a condition that requires patients to monitor their weight, fluid intake, and dietary salt, especially in the posthospitalization period. OBJECTIVE To examine the relationship between numeracy, health literacy, and cognition with 30-day readmissions among patients hospitalized for acute decompensated HF (ADHF). DESIGN/SETTING/PATIENTS The Vanderbilt Inpatient Cohort Study is a prospective longitudinal study of adults hospitalized with acute coronary syndromes and/or ADHF. We studied 883 adults hospitalized with ADHF. MEASUREMENTS During their hospitalization, a baseline interview was performed in which demographic characteristics, numeracy, health literacy, and cognition were assessed. Through chart review, clinical characteristics were determined. The outcome of interest was 30-day readmission to any acute care hospital. To examine the association between numeracy, health literacy, cognition, and 30-day readmissions, multivariable Poisson (log-linear) regression was used. RESULTS Of the 883 patients admitted for ADHF, 23.8% (n = 210) were readmitted within 30 days; 33.9% of the study population had inadequate numeracy skills, 24.6% had inadequate/marginal literacy skills, and 53% had any cognitive impairment. Numeracy and cognition were not associated with 30-day readmissions. Though (objective) health literacy was associated with 30-day readmissions in unadjusted analyses, it was not in adjusted analyses. CONCLUSIONS Numeracy, health literacy, and cognition were not associated with 30-day readmission among this sample of patients hospitalized with ADHF.