‘We have the internet in our hands’: Bangladeshi college students’ use of ICTs for health information

Innovations in Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs), and especially mobile health, have been predicted to transform provider-patient relationships through the dissemination of health information, and by encouraging patient autonomy , self-management, and self-care. People´s capacity to access health information is informed by power inequalities in health systems. 

Mobile Health for Ageing (mAgeing)

Health information, advice, and reminders delivered through mobile phones can encourage healthy behaviors and help older people to improve and maintain their intrinsic capacity. The WHO mobile health for Ageing (mAgeing) programme has been developed as one of the tools to support the implementation of WHO guidelines on community-level interventions to manage declines in intrinsic capacity – also known as the ICOPE Guidelines. The mAgeing programme can support routine care offered by health care professionals by supporting self-care and self-management.

The newly published Handbook helps countries develop, run, monitor, and evaluate the mAgeing programme within their own contexts, using basic technology common to most mobile phones.

Providing person-centred care for people with multiple chronic conditions: protocol for a qualitative study incorporating client and staff perspectives

Chronic conditions are associated with over one-third of potentially avoidable hospitalisations. Integrated care programmes aim to help people with chronic conditions to self-manage their health, thus avoiding hospital admissions. While founded on principles of person-centred care, the experiences of people with multiple chronic conditions in integrated care programmes are not widely known. This study explores how person-centred care is incorporated into an integrated care programme for people with multiple chronic conditions.

Patient-centered care in musculoskeletal practice: Key elements to support clinicians to focus on the person

Musculoskeletal rehabilitation, including physiotherapy, needs to move towards a broader biopsychosocial understanding of musculoskeletal conditions and the delivery of high-value care for people with persistent pain conditions, in which a patient-centered approach is a key feature. However, it has been reported that clinicians experience difficulties with integrating patient-centered care principles into their clinical practice. Based on a focused symposium about patient-centered care for patients with musculoskeletal conditions, held during the online 2021 World Physiotherapy Congress, the purpose of this article is to share key elements of the content of this symposium with a wider audience, aimed at enabling clinicians to enhance patient-centeredness in their current practice. These key elements include establishing meaningful connections, deciding together and self-management support. Moreover, challenges on patient-centered care in low/middle income countries will be discussed and recommendations to implement patient-centered care in clinical practice will be provided.

Highlights

• Patient-centered care is important in people ...