Patient Handout Reading Level Checker
Paste the text of a patient handout, discharge instructions, or a family letter. Scores update as you type.
Your text stays in this browser tab. Nothing is sent or saved.
Why the grade level matters
You write a handout for the person in front of you. Then it goes home with someone who is tired, worried, or reading in a second language. The AMA recommends writing patient materials at a 6th-grade level or below, and the NIH suggests 7th to 8th grade. Studies of patient education materials keep finding them above both lines.
How to use it
Paste the text. The scores update as you type. The checker lists only the sentences to fix. Each one is shaded, with the sentence before and after it in gray so you can find it in your handout. A sentence is flagged when it runs past 20 words or has three or more long words. Long words are underlined. Fix the shaded sentences first: splitting one long sentence usually moves the grade more than swapping a single word.
How to read the two scores
- SMOG grade. The school grade a reader needs to fully understand the text. It counts words of three or more syllables, and many health literacy guides prefer it because it aims at full comprehension.
- Flesch Reading Ease. A score from 0 to 100, where higher is easier. A 6th-grade text scores about 80 or above.
The verdict under the scores uses the SMOG grade.
What it cannot tell you
A formula counts syllables and sentence length. It cannot tell whether your reader knows what “take on an empty stomach” means, whether the steps are in the right order, or whether the layout buries the one instruction that matters. A handout can score at a 5th-grade level and still fail. Ask a real reader to explain it back to you.
The syllable counts are estimates, so on dense medical text this checker and other calculators can differ by a grade or more. SMOG is designed for samples of 30 sentences, and the checker says so when your text is shorter.
Your text stays on your device
The checker runs in your browser. Nothing you paste is sent to a server or saved. Even so, paste the handout template, never a note with patient details in it.
The checker gives you a number. Getting the handout under it is the hard part. Bring the handout you are least proud of to The Handout Rebuild in The AI Clinicians, a community I run for clinicians learning AI. Thirty minutes, nothing patient-specific, and you leave with a version your readers can finish.
Questions
Is this selling me something?
The checker has no sign-up and no limits. The only link on this page points to The AI Clinicians, for people who want help rewriting the handout.
Which score should I trust?
SMOG is the grade to plan around. Reading Ease is a second check on the same text. Higher is easier, and about 80 or above matches a 6th-grade level.
Is my text sent anywhere?
No. The scoring runs in this browser tab, and closing the tab clears it.