Engaged, Supported and Understood
Supported self-care from medi UK is an approach to addressing the long-term management of both venous and lymphatic disorders. Supported self-management is an evidence based approach used to address health and is highlighted as a priority by the NHS long term plan¹.
Supported self-care involves focusing on providing people with the knowledge, skills and tools they need to manage their own health care effectively. Supported self-care is more than providing a set treatment along with a list of instructions and abandoning your patient to go it alone, expecting them to feel empowered to self-care and manage their condition. Supported self-care is a way of working with patients as a healthcare partnership to enable people to maintain, or possibly even improve, their health over time. The supported self-care journey should be individualised to ensure the holistic needs of the patient are always at the centre of the decision making and treatment planning process.
Patients that are most likely to do well in supported self-care health scenarios need to:
- Be engaged: are they willing to self-care?
- Feel supported: are they happy with the Healthcare partnership? Do they know how to access healthcare advice? Do they have carers/family/friends to offer help or support?
- Understand: Do they understand their condition, their treatment plan and the importance of long term selfcare to manage their health condition?
Effective Self-Care Therapy
Here at medi UK, we have believed in our simple, safe, yet effective self-care therapy concepts for quite some time now. We are firm believers that, with the correct level of education, support and products, patients excel when given the opportunity to self-care and their conditions and quality of life improve.
Both venous diseases associated with active venous ulceration and chronic oedema are long term conditions and the key to successful management of associated symptoms is patient centred long term self-care.
Simple solutions (wound care therapy chain) + supported self-care strategies = successful patient outcomes.
Educate, educate, educate
Providing education about a patient’s health condition and treatment options are often key in promoting effective self-care strategies. Therefore, we have a range of educational material designed by healthcare professionals for patients from videos to written resources.
We have a patient-focused website that provided information and health advice to patients on a wide range of subjects from healthy diets and exercise to information about different health conditions and the healthcare professionals that specialise in them. We also have dedicated supported self-care section for patients too.
1 NHS. The NHS long term plan. 2019. https://www.longtermplan.nhs.uk/