Christos Tsagkaris, Orthopedic Surgery Resident at Solothurner Hospitals AG – soH, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“Would you ever ignore an important invitation? A life-changing or saving one? Probably not, unless reaching the destination felt too complicated. If this happens with a social event, it’s an inconvenience. But if it happens with an invitation to a cancer-screening appointment? Then it is a risk, a preventable risk.
Over the past years — from the European Health Parliament 2022 to the ΕU Cancer Summit — I kept returning to a question: We tell people to get screened. But do we always explain how? Where to go? How to book? Whether it’s free?
Across Europe, many people still navigate a labyrinth of referral rules, insurance conditions, waiting lists, digital forms, and language barriers. CancerWorld visualised it powerfully in the artwork below: a maze separating “health literacy” from what we truly need — health-rights literacy.
Because knowing that a mammography or a colonoscopy exists is not the same as knowing how to access it as a right.
For migrants, linguistic minorities, displaced people, and even older adults in rural communities, the challenge is even greater. Sometimes the invitation arrives in a language they barely read. Sometimes the instructions feel long, or intimidating. Sometimes the invitation doesn’t speak to them.
In my new article in CancerWorld, I explore this shift from information to navigation — from health literacy to health-rights literacy — and why Europe needs screening campaigns that:
- Tell people where to go and how to book in their locality
- Communicate in languages all people use
- Adapt messages to dialects and sociolects
- Use digital tools without leaving anyone behind
Many thanks to CancerWorld and Yeva Margaryan for extending the invitation and hosting this idea. Looking forward to take this conversation further with all those working with screening programmes, public health, patient support and advocacy, migrant health and beyond.”
More posts featuring Christos Tsagkaris.
