Patient education

Abstract

There are a wide range of opportunities for arthritis patient education including individual or group counselling, printed notes and the Internet. Over the past 20 years efforts have been made to evaluate patient education programmes and determine if they are effective and, more recently, whether they are cost-effective. In the short term (up to 6-12 months) structured educational programmes have been demonstrated to increase patient knowledge and improve desirable behaviours such as relaxation, exercise and compliance with medications. More controversial has been the long term outcome (>12 months) of these programmes. Some studies indicate continuing benefit, albeit at reduced levels, compared to earlier evaluation points. Other studies, including a recent Cochrane report suggest that the beneficial effects are not sustained. In conclusion, patient education programmes have a modest, but significant, benefit on patient knowledge and behaviour, at least in the short term.

Rheumatoid arthritis patients' knowledge of the disease and its treatments: A descriptive study

“…There is evidence that patient education basically improves RA patients' understanding of the progress of the disease, as well as their awareness of its treatments (Niedermann et al, 2004;Schrieber and Colley, 2004) and, especially, their knowledge of the disease-specifi c facts (Helliwell et al, 1999). However, in the study by Kirwan et al (2005), RA patients who did not accept the educational programme did not benefi t from patient education and experienced only short-term benefi ts.…”

“…The duration of RA has not previously been found to infl uence knowledge levels (Barlow et al, 1999;Hennell et al, 2004;Hill et al, 1991). However, RA patients' health status has not been improved by such patient education programmes (Niedermann et al, 2004;Riemsma et al, 2003;Schrieber and Colley, 2004).…”

“…The purpose of RA patient education is to provide patients with knowledge so that they can monitor and manage the symptoms caused by RA, and so that they can make decisions concerning their daily lives (Kääriäinen and Kyngäs, 2005;Schrieber and Colley, 2004). Ramos-Remus et al (2000) accentuated that the content of patient education is supposed to be a balance of what health care providers want to teach, the educational needs that providers think that patients have and, fi nally, what the patients want and think they need to know.…”

Effect of an education programme for patients with osteoarthritis in primary care - a randomized controlled trial

“…Patient education programmes are often defined as a planned learning experience to influence a patient's knowledge and health behaviour [7]. Education can be given by a physician as part of a consultation, in small groups or delivered by multidisciplinary team [7,8].…”

“…Education can be given by a physician as part of a consultation, in small groups or delivered by multidisciplinary team [7,8]. Research suggests that patient education is feasible and valuable in terms of improvements in quality of life, function, well-being and improved coping [9-13].…”