Undergraduate creators of video, animations and blended media: The students' perspective

Abstract

More than half of all adults in developed countries have low health literacy levels and do not possess the necessary skills and ability to manage their own health. Therefore it is vital that new health professionals are equipped to recognize and effectively communicate with individuals with low health literacy. This paper will describe 4th year Pharmacy undergraduate students’ perspective of the creation and use of video, animations and/ or multimedia to communicate diet-disease relationships to individuals with low health literacy via the use of a series of scaffolded activities; a community based survey and subsequent literature review, construction of a storyboard and written audio script to communicate the health message, construction of a multimedia product and ultimately gaining feedback on the multimedia product from the target audience. Prior to producing the multimedia product students were apprehensive, anxious and intimidated (27%, 39%, 26% respectively), but also indicated they were excited, wanted to have ‘fun’ or use their creative talents (45%, 40%, 37% respectively). Time and lack of technical skills were perceived as barriers (67% and 50% respectively). Overall, all students effectively produced multimedia products to successfully communicate health messages to individuals with low health literacy, with 87% proud of their achievements.