The Role of Digital Health Technologies on Maternal Health Literacy: A Narrative Review

Introduction

Technologies are reshaping life as we know it and society is inevitably evolving and adjusting itself to this transformation. This evolution benefits society as it brings innovative solutions, improves effectiveness, and quality, and personalizes resources and services. Digital transformation has also been applied in the healthcare system and the continuous incorporation of technologies in healthcare is, therefore, a challenge not only for healthcare providers and stakeholders but also for patients (Frisinger & Papachristou, 2023; Stoumpos et al., 2023). The global strategy of the World Health Organization (WHO) for digital health advocates that digital health should be an integral part of health priorities and must benefit people in an ethical, safe, secure, reliable, equitable, and sustainable way (Dhingra & Dabas, 2020). Also, digital transformation of health care has proven to hold the potential to enhance health outcomes, which can be achieved by improving “medical diagnosis, data-based treatment decisions, digital therapeutics, clinical trials, self-management of care and person-centered care, as well as creating more evidence-based knowledge, skills and competence for professionals to support health care”. Faced with the potential of new technologies and the digitalization of healthcare, knowing its patient-centered appropriateness, the application regarding health literacy has been the subject of many studies (Almeida, 2024; Bello et al., 2022; Rahayu & Haningsih, 2021).

Health literacy is defined by the International Union for Health Promotion and Education (IUHPE) as the combination of personal competencies and situational resources needed for people to access, understand, appraise, and use information and services to make decisions (Bröder et al., 2018). It escalates in importance when addressing pregnancy. Maternal health literacy refers to the women’s knowledge, skills, and motivation to seek, access, understand, and apply health information to achieve and preserve their health and the infants’ health (Donelle et al., 2021). The collaboration required between health professionals and pregnant women during pregnancy is key to preventing health-related challenges during this sensitive time of women’s lives (Meldgaard et al., 2022). Therefore, health literacy must be constantly interacting with health literacy responsiveness, which consists of “the way that services, environments, and products make health information and support available and accessible to people with different health literacy strengths and limitations” (Dhingra & Dabas, 2020). The balance between these two concepts plays a critical role in ensuring the success of healthcare, including during pregnancy, affecting the well-being of expectant mothers, their infants, and family. Low health literacy might negatively impact the success of pregnancy, increasing the risk of complications for both mothers and newborns, including gestational diabetes mellitus, maternal mental diseases, low birth weight, stillbirth, and congenital malformations (Meldgaard et al., 2022). Another important aspect that must be highlighted is the fact that low health literacy is also associated with low education level, employment, age, and ethnicity (Pierce et al., 2023), therefore merging vulnerabilities in an already sensitive stage of life. Cultural barriers and social inequities are also present in all settings, and it is essential to recognize them to adopt strategies that are suitable for a specific population. Without this recognition, no intervention can be successful.

Pregnancy must be perceived as a strategic moment and opportunity to promote health literacy, identify social inequalities, and cultural barriers, and help families to achieve their health potential. Recent developments in digital health have allowed innovative and personalized approaches to maternal health literacy and may have great potential for the promotion of maternal and infant health outcomes and the reduction of health disparities (Bekyieriya et al., 2023). Technologies can empower patients, facilitating women’s participation in the health-providing process, decision-making, and information-seeking (Stoumpos et al., 2023).