The Inherent Complexities of Pediatric Cardiac Surgery: A Health Literacy Perspective

Articles in Press

Document Type : Letter to the editor

Authors

1 Department of Cardiac Surgery, Imam Reza Hospital, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran.

2 Pediatric and Congenital Cardiology Division, Department of Pediatric, Faculty of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran.

3 Department of Anesthesiology, Razavi Hospital, Imam Reza International University, Mashhad, Iran.

4 Department of Extra-Corporeal Circulation (ECC), Razavi Hospital, Imam Reza International University, Mashhad, Iran.

Abstract

Pediatric cardiac surgery involves navigating profound perplexities for caregivers, from understanding intricate pathophysiology to managing long-term care. So, explore these challenges through a health literacy lens, arguing that low health literacy exacerbates inherent difficulties, jeopardizing informed consent and postoperative outcomes. It is concluded that integrating health literacy sensitive communication is not ancillary but fundamental to achieving equitable, high-quality, and family-centered care.

Keywords

Acknowledgment: Not applicable.


Availability of data and materials: Not applicable.


Conflicts of interest: All authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.


Consent for publication: Not applicable.


Ethics approval and consent to participate: Not applicable.


Funding: None.


Authors' Contribution: M. H. M.: Contributed to the conception and design of the study, critical revision, and approval of the manuscript's final version; M. R. N. S. and G.K.: Contributed to acquiring data, drafting the manuscript, and approving the final version. M. Y.: Contributed to the conception and design of the study, data interpretation, drafting of the manuscript, critical revision, and approval of the final version.


Declaration of AI Use: All authors declare that they have not used any AI tools or technologies to prepare this manuscript.

 

Open Access Policy: This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

References

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Journal of Health Literacy

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 22 November 2025

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