The Contribution of Health Education to Chronic Disease Management

A special issue of Healthcare (ISSN 2227-9032). This special issue belongs to the section "Chronic Care".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 November 2024 | Viewed by 695

Special Issue Editors

School of Nursing, Tung Wah College, Hong Kong SAR, China
Interests: health education; cardiometabolic disease; hypertension; chronic disease management; lifestyle intervention

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Guest Editor
School of Nursing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong 999077, China
Interests: cancer; geriatrics; palliative care; caregiving
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Guest Editor
The Nethersole School of Nursing, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Interests: systematic review; mHealth; cardiometabolic disease; hypertension; diabetes; lifestyle modifications

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Educational interventions have been effective to improve outcomes in patients with chronic disease. It has been shown effective in patients with hypertension, cardiometabolic disease and cancer. Lifestyle modifications in terms of healthy lifestyle and regular exercise are recognized important in the management of hypertension and cardiometabolic disease. Educational interventions, such as health education, telephone counseling, e-health support in terms of phone text message, web-based support or mobile applications could effectively improve the adherence to lifestyle modifications and improve physical and psychological outcomes. Supportive educational programmes to cancer patients and their caregivers could improve their physical, psychological wellbeing and quality of life. Given the prevalence of cardiometabolic disease and hypertension with the increasing trend in middle- age or early older adult, and the continuous increasing trend of cancer prevalence, timely professional support to self-health management to decrease the development of adverse health complications and cancer care in the community are crucial in health care.

This Special Issue invites original contributions on the use of health education in different modes and contexts to improve chronic disease management. We welcome submissions from any setting, context, and academic discipline that address groups, individuals, or caregivers for chronic disease patients, such as cardiometabolic disease, hypertension, and cancer. We particularly encourage nursing or interdisciplinary research projects. Authors can submit reports of intervention studies on the effectiveness or efficacy of educational interventions on chronic disease outcomes, qualitative reports of intervention studies on experiences and perspectives of the participants and stakeholders involved in the interventions, mixed-methods intervention studies, and reviews of intervention studies. The reviews can cover (but are not limited to) various types of reviews, such as systematic reviews, integrative reviews, umbrella reviews, scoping reviews and narrative reviews of any intervention studies related to lifestyle interventions or innovations in patient education or supportive care for patients with chronic diseases or their caregivers. The Special Issue is interested in studies that target populations who are at risk or have chronic disease such as coronary heart disease, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, hypertension, and cancer.

Dr. Eliza Wong
Dr. Doris Y. P. Leung
Dr. Hon Lon Tam
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • health education or educational intervention
  • innovation or technology
  • chronic disease management
  • cardiometabolic disease
  • metabolic syndrome
  • hypertension
  • cancer care
  • caregiver

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

18 pages, 2743 KiB  
Article
Use of the Consumer Health Literacy Quotient to Quantify and Explore Self-Care Readiness Among Consumers in Four Asia-Pacific Countries
by Vandana Garg, Zee Alcasid, Katherine Mendoza, Heesoo Lee, Yi Xin Loo, Andy Nong, Gerard W. Toh and Sheryl Tan
Healthcare 2024, 12(22), 2318; https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare12222318 - 20 Nov 2024
Viewed by 230
Abstract
Background/Objectives: Self-care has great potential to benefit consumers and health systems, but its mainstream adoption is hindered by a systemic lack of consumer health literacy (HL). Published data on consumer awareness of self-care and HL are limited for regions in Asia, and are [...] Read more.
Background/Objectives: Self-care has great potential to benefit consumers and health systems, but its mainstream adoption is hindered by a systemic lack of consumer health literacy (HL). Published data on consumer awareness of self-care and HL are limited for regions in Asia, and are needed to develop interventions to enhance HL and self-care for diverse populations in this region. The aim of this research was to describe and analyze patterns of HL and awareness of self-care among consumers in Asia. Methods: We conducted a mixed-methods study comprising qualitative focus group discussions (FGDs; 64 participants) followed by a quantitative online survey (1200 participants) among consumers in four Asian countries (India, Philippines, Malaysia, and Republic of Korea). We examined five dimensions of HL and self-care relevant to consumers: actively managing health; confidence/skills to find and access health information; confidence/skills to appraise information; support from social circle; and support from healthcare providers. From the quantitative survey, responses for 16 questions covering the five dimensions were used to calculate the Consumer Health Literacy Quotient (CHLQ; normalized range 0–100), an index we developed to assess HL in the context of personal wellness and self-treatable conditions. Latent class analysis (LCA) was applied to identify distinctive patterns of consumer HL within the sample. Results: The mean CHLQ was 75 out of 100 (SD ± 12.9), indicating ‘moderate’ levels of consumer HL across the countries. LCA identified five distinct consumer HL profiles, differing in their average CHLQ (overall score) and along the CHLQ dimensions. Consistent with CHLQ results, the profiles differed in their response patterns for common self-manageable ailments. Conclusions: This study identified distinct patterns of HL and awareness of self-care among consumers in four Asian countries through combined use of the CHLQ and quantitative profiling. This offers a promising approach for understanding self-care-related HL among consumers in Asia. Our findings on patterns of strengths and weakness in specific dimensions of HL and self-care in diverse populations can inform research, communications, and targeted interventions to empower consumers and foster self-care. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Contribution of Health Education to Chronic Disease Management)
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