Assessment of health literacy with the Newest Vital Sign and its correlation with body mass index in female adolescent students.

Background One of the significant outcomes of health education is health literacy (HL), which should be expanded to improve health promotion. Objective The aim of this study was to assess HL and its relationship with Body Mass Index (BMI) in female adolescent students. Subjects This study was conducted on 235 female students (aged 13-15 years) which were selected with cluster sampling. Methods For assessing HL, the Newest Vital Sign (NVS) was used and BMI Z-score was evaluated following the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 16. Results Based on this study's results, 11.5%, 37% and 51.5% of adolescents had adequate HL, limited HL and inadequate HL, respectively. There was a negative correlation between adolescents HL and BMI, rs = -0.233 (p < 0.001). Conclusion Most of adolescents had limited HL and students with higher BMI had a worse HL score. As a matter of fact, as adequate HL has a significant role for promoting health in the society policy makers must design educational programs for adolescents especially in non-medical settings such as schools where adolescents spend most of their time.