Serum uric acid levels and longitudinal change in cognitive function in older adults: a sex-stratified population-based study.

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health literacy as personal knowledge and competencies mediated by organizational structures and the availability of resources that enable people to access, understand, appraise and use information and services in ways that promote and maintain good health and well-being for themselves and those around them []. Under the model proposed by Sørensen et al. [], the health literacy levels of populations are affected by factors external to individuals (e.g., socioeconomic, cultural, and educational status), as well as by proximal factors (e.g., individual cognitive abilities, family context, experiences with health systems, and age). Moreover, health literacy plays a key role in the three main domains of health (healthcare, disease prevention and health promotion). Adequate health literacy contributes to the improvement of the health status of populations due to the adoption of health-promoting and disease-preventive behaviors and to a more regulated and effective use of health services with a consequent reduction in health costs []. A group of European experts developed and validated a measurement instrument, the HLS-EU-Q (), allowing the construction of four levels of health literacy (inadequate, problematic, sufficient and excellent) for each of the three health domains, as well as for a global domain []. Assessing and promoting the health literacy of higher education students is fundamental for empowering them to make decisions about their own health and for promoting their intentional involvement in collective health promotion actions on health determinants, as recommended []. The goal of placing health literacy on the educational and academic agenda is to align with the declaration resulting from the 9th Conference on Global Health Promotion, which establishes (among others) an articulation between health literacy and sustainable development goals for 2030 [].