Health information only works when people understand it. Yet across Australia, a huge share of the population cannot make sense of the fact sheets, consent forms and discharge summaries the health system produces every day.
This is not a fringe problem. It affects nearly half of all adults, and it shapes whether people take medication correctly, turn up for screening, or give genuinely informed consent.
In this post we look at the state of health literacy in Australia, why written health information so often fails, and how visual and accessible communication helps health teams reach the people who need them most.
The state of health literacy in Australia
The numbers deserve more attention than they get. Research shows that 44% of Australian adults lack the functional literacy skills required to cope with the demands of everyday life and work. Studies also indicate that around 30% of adults do not read past a grade six level.
Now add language to the picture. According to ABS census data, 23% of Australians do not speak English at home, and collectively Australians speak more than 300 languages.
Put those figures together and the challenge becomes clear. A large portion of any Australian audience will struggle with a message delivered as dense English text, no matter how carefully you write it.
For health services, the stakes are higher than in almost any other sector. Misunderstood information leads to missed appointments, medication errors, avoidable readmissions and patients agreeing to procedures they never fully understood.
That is why health literacy is inseparable from accessible communication. If your information cannot be understood by the people it exists to help, it is not really information at all.
Why written health information fails
Most health communication still leans almost entirely on text. Brochures, letters, consent packs, websites and posters all assume the reader is confident, fluent and has time to spare. Those assumptions fail more often than most organisations realise.
The first problem is reading level. Patient information is usually written by clinical and legal teams, and the result tends to sit far above the level many Australians read comfortably. The document is accurate, but the understanding is lost.
The second problem is volume. When a consent pack runs past 30 pages, even confident readers switch off. For someone with low literacy, it is simply a wall.
The third problem is language. Translating dense documents into even a fraction of the 300 plus languages spoken in Australia is slow and expensive. And a translated wall of text is still a wall of text.
There is also a simpler truth underneath all of this. Research suggests roughly half of people identify as visual learners, yet most health information assumes everyone learns best by reading. That mismatch alone guarantees a portion of your audience will be left behind.
What visual communication changes
Visual communication is not decoration. It works because of how human memory is built.
Psychologists call it the Picture Superiority Effect. When information arrives as imagery, the brain encodes it both visually and verbally, while words alone trigger only verbal encoding. Studies indicate people learn and retain visual information far better than text.
Visuals also travel across the barriers that stop text. A well designed animation can carry a health message across language, literacy and cultural lines at once, which is why our healthcare video production work always starts with clarity rather than polish. Two projects show what that looks like in practice.
Northern Health and the Story of Mia
Northern Health needed to communicate a difficult message to a highly diverse patient community. The familiar obstacles were all present: overwhelming content, translation needs and accessibility requirements.
The answer was the Story of Mia, a campaign built around relatable hero characters. Instead of explaining the system from the institution’s point of view, it simplified the problem and let patients see themselves in the story.
It was a small change with a big result. When people recognise themselves in a character, comprehension and trust follow naturally.
The CEIH and the future of consent
The Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health faced one of the hardest communication tasks in healthcare: genomic testing consent. The process relied on more than 30 pages of legal documentation for a topic that is complex and overwhelming even for clinicians.
Patients found it hard to fully understand what they were agreeing to. That undermines the entire purpose of consent.
The solution was a digital consent platform that presents the same legally sound information visually. Patient understanding improved, translations became far easier to support, and consent moved out of the consultation itself. That last change gave clinicians more time to spend with each patient.
It works inside health organisations too
Visual communication is not only for patients. Research shows 86% of employees and executives attribute workplace failures to poor communication and collaboration, and health organisations are as exposed to this as anyone.
One team we know of made a single change: adding short video briefs alongside their written ones. Instructions became clearer, misunderstandings dropped, and the team saw a productivity lift of around 20%.
Practical guidance for health communication teams
Accessible communication is a discipline, not a garnish. Here is where to focus first.
Start with how your audience actually learns. People absorb information in different ways, and matching format to preference dramatically improves comprehension and retention.
| Learning style | What works |
|---|---|
| Visual learners | Infographics, diagrams, charts, video and animation |
| Auditory learners | Verbal walkthroughs, webinars, podcasts and audio recordings |
| Reading and writing learners | Written briefs, articles, reports and space for note taking |
| Kinaesthetic learners | Hands-on activities, props, simulations and interactive platforms |
No single format reaches everyone, which is why the strongest health campaigns combine imagery, sound, text and interaction. Then apply a few proven principles to whatever you create.
- Be clear and concise. Speak to your audience, be specific and remove the fluff. In health communication, less is more.
- Tell stories. People remember stories, not raw information, and characters like Mia make complex journeys feel personal and safe.
- Be credible. Use facts and comparisons your audience can actually relate to.
- Design for accessibility from the start. Consider contrast, colour choices, plain language, captions and translations so the message works for diverse audiences regardless of individual needs.
- Be genuine. Your communications should look and feel like your organisation, immediately and consistently.
- Be distinctive. People are far more likely to recall information that looks unique, a phenomenon known as the Distinctiveness Effect. Content that looks like everything else quietly signals it does not matter.
- Get personal. Targeted, authentic imagery helps people recognise themselves and engage more deeply.
- Keep improving. Welcome feedback and adjust, because effective communication is never set and forget.
One more point for public health teams: visual content on social media is around 40 times more likely to be shared. If your campaign needs to travel beyond your own channels, visuals are what carry it.
Consistency matters as much as quality. A single explainer will not shift health literacy on its own, and we have written before about how a healthcare content subscription can keep patient education, staff training and campaign content flowing month after month.
Where to start
You do not need to redesign every document at once. Pick the piece of communication that fails most often, whether that is a consent process, a discharge summary or a training module, and rebuild it visually. Measure the difference, then move to the next one.
Many of the ideas in this post come from our free ebook, Leading with Vision, which covers the research, case studies and content principles in more depth. You can grab it through the Download our free guide banner in the footer of our site.
And if you would rather have a partner than a project, that is exactly what our Content as a Service plans are for. You get a dedicated creative team producing the videos, animations and visual assets your audience actually understands, week after week. Get in touch and let’s make your health information work for everyone.
