Health Education for People with Non-Communicable Diseases

According to the WHO, non-communicable diseases such as chronic heart and lung diseases, insult, cancer, diabetes or rheumatoid arthritis, accounted for around 40 million deaths worldwide in 2015, which is around 70% of the total number of deaths. These numbers can be decreased by reducing behaviour that is harmful to health (e.g. inactivity due to pain, avoiding excessive stress) and the targeted increase in behaviour that is beneficial to health.

However, the health literacy of people with non-communicable diseases is significantly lower than that of the healthy population. It forms the basis for self-management and quality of life. But how can health literacy, self-management, behavioural changes and self-efficacy be optimally promoted in a therapeutic setting?

The aim of the project is to develop an individualised and sustainable health education concept that incorporates new media. In a first step, the educational needs of those affected are collected and taken into account in the design phase. In a later phase of the project, parts of the concept should also be tested and evaluated with regard to health literacy and self-efficacy.

• Project team: Ruckser-Scherb, Dielacher, Lettner-Hauser, Ludwig, Estl, Großauer
• Research entity: Department of Occupational Therapy