Self-care: Councils helping people look after themselves

11 March 2019
Self-care: Councils helping people look after themselves

In a new report written by the Local Government Association (LGA), they outline the virtues of Self-Care and provide case studies where Councils are working with CCGs and other partners to make a real difference to people’s lives.

Active+ a collaboration between CCG, Huntingdon District Council, Eastern AHSN, Huntingdon Community Cancer Network and healthcare innovator Activ8rlives encourages cancer and cardiac rehabilitation patients to become active and involved in self-monitoring and self-care for their recovery and future health and wellbeing.

The report writes “Around 80 per cent of all care in the UK is self-care. The majority of people feel comfortable managing everyday minor ailments like coughs and colds themselves; particularly when they feel confident in recognising the symptoms and have successfully treated using OTC medicine before.

Empowering people with the confidence and information to look after themselves when they can, and visit the GP when they need to, gives people greater control of their own health and encourages healthy behaviours that help prevent ill health in the long-term. In many cases people can take care of their minor ailments, reducing the number of consultations and enabling health care professionals to focus on caring for higher risk patients, such as those with comorbidities, the very young and elderly, managing long-term conditions and providing new services”.