The Regional Minister of Health closes the 15th edition of the programme, stressing that it is a successful, consolidated programme that will be continued.
Since it was created seven years ago, nearly 300 active patient trainers have been trained.
The Active Patient programme has incorporated four new diseases in recent editions to continue training active patient trainers. These are chronic non-oncological pain, inflammatory bowel disease, major depression and head and neck cancer.
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The Active Patient programme incorporates new illnesses such as major depression and chronic non-oncological pain
Since its inception seven years ago, it has trained a total of 280 active patient trainers. The programme is now in its 15th year, with workshops being held in the Balearic Islands, and on this occasion, it has received the support of the Regional Minister of Health, Manuela García, who stressed that it is a successful, consolidated programme that will be continued.
The councillor praised its beginnings, stressing that it was born ‘to improve the health and quality of life of people with chronic illnesses and carers, through mechanisms of support, accompaniment and peer-to-peer training, which allow them to acquire greater autonomy and effectiveness in their care’.
There are currently 226 active patient trainers and active caregiver trainers: 194 in Mallorca, 13 in Menorca and 19 in Ibiza.
The Active Patient programme has been incorporating different health problems since its creation. There are workshops related to diabetes, chronic kidney disease, heart failure and ischaemic heart disease, multiple sclerosis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), breast cancer, people with ostomies, fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome, inflammatory joint diseases, stroke, gynaecological cancer, primary immunodeficiencies and carers.
In the first half of 2024, 11 peer-to-peer workshops were held with 139 people completing them, and an average of 13 people per workshop. As of July, 8 workshops have already taken place, of which seven have been completed and one is still ongoing. Throughout 2024, 94 primary care professionals have also been trained.
The training groups of the Active Patient programme are aimed at people who have a chronic disease so that they can learn more about it and adopt habits or behaviours that can improve their health. Active patient trainers are the leaders of these patient groups; in other words, they play the role of educators, teaching their peers to understand the disease, to make decisions and to be responsible for their own health, always with the support of a health professional.
The programme has between one and three professionals in each health centre in Mallorca. It also has an implementation team made up of 26 primary care professionals in Mallorca, with the main objective of setting up new training courses for active patient trainers and active caregiver trainers and helping health centres organise and initiate peer-to-peer workshops. Each hospital in Mallorca has also set up a subcommittee of the programme, with the same objective as the primary care implementation team. Likewise, the Menorca and Ibiza and Formentera Health Areas have their corresponding subcommittees.
The Active Patient programme is part of the Health Service’s Care Plan for People with Chronic Illnesses and is aligned with the Ministry of Health, Consumer Affairs and Social Welfare’s Strategy for Dealing with Chronicity. It was created with the intention of improving the health and quality of life of chronic patients and their carers by means of mechanisms of support, accompaniment and peer-to-peer training that enable them to acquire more autonomy and effectiveness in their care.