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Introduction: The last decade has witnessed a broad and empowering conceptualisation of health literacy which has been defined as the capacity of individuals to obtain, process and understand the necessary health information to make appropriate health decisions. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the concept evolvement, the instruments to measurehealth literacy, the models explaining its determinants and consequences, and the role of nursing in further development of the concept. Methods: Literature review was performed by a descriptive method. The search of the scientific and professional works was performed between January 2012 and August 2012, through the following databases: PubMed, Medline, CINAHL, Health Source: Nursing / Academic Edition, Academic Search Premier, Google and COBIB.SI, and with the following key words: i) health AND literacy, ii) health AND literacy AND assessment, iii) health AND literacy AND definitions, iv) health AND literacy AND models, v) health AND literacy AND nursing. In the Slovenian database COBIB.SI, the search was performed with selected Slovenian phrases. The literature review was limited to scientific journals, peer-reviewed articles and full texts. In the first step, 11,579 works were obtained. In the second step, the search was narrowed by additional criteria related to the objectives of the qualitative review. The search yielded 100 scientific papers that describe and explain the concept of health literacy. Results: Health literacy has been developing from the medical concept toward a public health and health education concept. Several measurement tools and theoretical models currently used give no satisfactory answers to the questionof how individuals' health literacy affects the health system - its costs, quality of health services, health outcomes. Discussion and conclusion: Assessment of health literacy of individuals and groups is the foundation on which health education programs should be built. Also in Slovenia, it is necessary to develop a screening instrument, through which it will be possible to identify the risk groups, and develop intervention plans to increase their health literacy.