Patient involvement in disease management: A holistic approach in clinical pharmacy

Abstract

Clinical pharmacy is one of the specialized areas of pharmacy profession which demands scientific and comprehensive therapeutic knowledge, extensive clinical experience and skills, and collaboration with other healthcare professionals as well as the patients in disease management. The concepts of patient involvement and patient empowerment, patient self-management and patient engagement in health care settings are explored in many studies. The PubMed search undertaken in March 2019 by using the keywords of ‘patient involvement,’ ‘disease management,’ and ‘clinical pharmacy’ revealed 581 publications, of those 268 were published in the last five years and 95 were review articles. Another search made by using the words of ‘patient empowerment’ and ‘clinical pharmacy,’ and the results were even increased to 735 articles. A patient-centered approach is the cornerstone of the provision of clinical pharmacy services in chronic disease management. The patient’s ability in problem-solving can be enhanced through teaching general skills and providing access to appropriate counseling or supervision. Therefore, patients become responsible for many issues, such as describing their symptoms and expressing their concerns properly, using specific self-management practices, and applying preventative approaches in their disease management. During the disease management process, roles and responsibilities of healthcare professionals and patients should be specified, and patients become less severely incapacitated by disease consequences, well-informed about their condition and medications, and have higher self-esteem to improve their condition or prevent their condition becoming worse. [Med-Science 2020; 9(1.000): 205-6]

Keywords

• clinical pharmacy
• patient empowerment
• disease management