Patient Education in Disease Management

Abstract

While patient education is recognized as part of disease management, it often gets minimal attention in actual programs, where the emphasis falls far more on providers. If patient education is expanded to include an emphasis on confirming, reinforcing, and maintaining the improved behavior that providers wish patients to adopt, it can significantly improve the long-term success of such programs. This will require tracking the results of such programs in terms of impact on the quality of life of patients, as well as on their compliance and benefits to education sponsors. Educational programs should also include reminding patients of the benefits they have gained and promoting their awareness, appreciation, and attribution of those benefits. They should also reinforce patients' expectations of future benefits by a combination of reminders of past benefits and promises of their continuation, and continue their commitment to tracking and reminding patients of such future benefits.