HCA 130 Module 7 A Short Report for a Manager Example

Are Our Handouts Readable? A Short Report to the Clinic Manager

Student Name

Health Care Administration Program, Aspen University

HCA 130: Healthcare Writing and Communications

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

Are Our Handouts Readable? A Short Report to the Clinic Manager

Managers need information in a form they can act on quickly. A short report summarizes facts, draws conclusions and recommends actions, usually in a few pages. This paper presents a composite report prepared for a family clinic's office manager on the readability of the clinic's patient handouts, then explains how it was written and why each choice was made.

The Assignment

After the success of a rewritten fasting blood test handout, the office manager asked a health care administration intern to review the clinic's other patient handouts and report whether they needed revision. The manager wanted to know how many were hard to read, which ones mattered most and what fixing them would take.

The Report: Summary

To: Office Manager. From: Administrative Intern. Subject: Readability of our 20 patient handouts.

Summary: Fourteen of our 20 handouts are written above the 8th grade level, and six are above the 12th. The six hardest include three we give out most often: diabetes medicines, blood thinner safety and colonoscopy preparation. I recommend rewriting these three first, testing them with patients and setting an 8th grade maximum for new materials. The work would take about 30 staff hours over two months.

The Report: Method

I collected all 20 handouts from the front desk and exam rooms, entered the text into an online readability calculator that reports several formulas and used the average grade level. I also counted how often each handout was given out in May, using the supply log. Because these scores count only sentence length and syllables, I treated them as a first screen rather than a verdict.

The Report: Findings

The table lists the ten most-used handouts.

The Report: Why It Matters

Many adults cannot read material at these levels easily. Federal survey data show that over a third of American adults read health material at only the two lowest skill levels (Kutner et al., 2006). Our findings match published research: handouts sampled from three sources clinicians rely on averaged well above an 8th grade reading level (Stossel et al., 2012). Handouts that patients cannot read do not change what patients do.

The Report: Recommendations

First, rewrite the diabetes medicines, blood thinner and colonoscopy handouts using the method used for the fasting test handout, about eight hours each including patient testing. Second, adopt an 8th grade maximum for any new handout, checked before printing. Third, review the remaining handouts over the following year, starting with the most used. The federal health literacy toolkit offers templates and a step-by-step process the clinic can follow (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, 2024).

The Report: Limits

Readability scores measure sentence and word length, not whether patients understand or act on a handout. The audit did not test handouts with patients or check their medical accuracy. Those steps are part of the recommended rewrites.

Writing Choice: Conclusions First

The report puts the summary before the method and findings. Managers read the top of a report and decide whether to read more. A report that builds to its conclusion forces the manager to read everything to learn the answer. The summary also includes the cost in staff hours, since that is what the manager must approve.

Writing Choice: Numbers the Manager Can Use

The report gives counts, 14 of 20 and six above the 12th grade, rather than percentages of a small number. It adds how often each handout is used, which turns a list of scores into a priority order. A handout at the 13th grade given out 84 times a month matters more than one at the 14th grade given out rarely.

Writing Choice: A Table Instead of Prose

Ten handouts with two numbers each would make a dense paragraph. A table lets the manager compare them at a glance and see that the three recommended for rewriting are both hard to read and frequently used. The table is limited to the ten most used; the full list went in an appendix.

Writing Choice: Brief Evidence

The manager needs to know that the problem is real and common, not a full literature review. The report gives one national figure and one study in a short paragraph. The intern kept a longer list of sources in case the manager asked.

What Was Left Out

The first draft included a paragraph on how each readability formula works and a detailed history of the clinic's handouts. Both were cut. They were accurate but did not help the manager decide. A short report is defined as much by what it leaves out as by what it includes.

The Report's Tone

The report reports problems without criticizing the staff who wrote or chose the old handouts. It describes the handouts, not their authors, and credits the fasting test revision as a model already working in the clinic. A report that assigns blame makes the manager's job of leading the change harder.

Format for a Busy Reader

The report uses the memo heading, a bold Summary label, short sections with plain labels and one table. It fits on a page and a half. Anything the manager might want later, such as the full list of 20 handouts and the formulas used, went into an appendix rather than the body.

What the Manager Did

The manager approved the first two recommendations the same day and asked for the third to be scheduled after the three rewrites were tested. Because the report named the handouts, hours and order of work, no follow-up meeting was needed to clarify it.

Conclusion

A short report for a manager answers the manager's questions at the top, supports its conclusions with a few clear numbers and a table, gives brief evidence and makes specific, costed recommendations. The readability report shows how 20 handouts can be summarized in a page and a half so that the manager can approve a plan in minutes.

References

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. (2024). AHRQ health literacy universal precautions toolkit (3rd ed.). https://www.ahrq.gov/health-literacy/improve/precautions/index.html

Kutner, M., Greenberg, E., Jin, Y., & Paulsen, C. (2006). The health literacy of America's adults: Results from the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NCES 2006-483). U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2006/2006483.pdf

Stossel, L. M., Segar, N., Gliatto, P., Fallar, R., & Karani, R. (2012). Readability of patient education materials available at the point of care. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 27(9), 1165-1170. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-012-2046-0