A FREE NHS course for adults who care for someone living with a disability or long-term health condition.

Course covers relaxation, dealing with tiredness, coping with depression, future planning andis about you making time to look after your own health needs and take more control of your situation and make a difference to your life. CONTACT ADDRESS AS ABOVE. John writes : In 2004 I attended what is known as an Expert Patients Course. The idea of this course is to help people with long term health conditions to take more care over their own health by understanding their conditions, leading to an improved quality of life. It takes place in small groups say of 10 plus patients in a relaxing atmosphere. In my group there were two patients with COPD, the others for example might have had manic-depression or chronic depression, chronic glaucoma, deafness, chronic heart failure, chronic bronchitis/asthma, athritis, epilepsy and so forth. Remember that it is estimated that over 17 m. people in the UK live with long-term conditions. What do COPD patients benefit from in this course?

Well it follows on neatly from pulmonary rehabilitation and explores subjects in more depth. The aims are to :

Feel confident and in control of their lives
Aim to manage their condition and its treatment in partnership with health care professionals.
Communicate effectively with professionals and are willing to share responsibility on treatment.
Are realistic about the impact of their disease on themselves and their family.
Use their skills and knowledge to lead full lives.

Usually they are around 2 hours long once a week for 6 weeks and are often led by trained patients who have a long-term health condition themselves. You may very well make friends with one of the group or as I did with the leader, and of course you will realise that you are not alone suffering with your disability. Of course members are asked not to attend with an infection so hopefully you won't catch anything!

Well I expect that it would come as something of a relief. You will have a list of specific questions you would like to ask your GP, and then supply some answers and solutions to problems yourself. For example, you may even be able to diagnose yourself and ask questions, will be able to ask questions about treatment options, often need to explore doseage requirements for medications, tell your GP about your side effects and ask how you can impove the situation. Making a list of questions is important since GPs these days have only 10 minutes with you and the list will focus your mind on any problems that you might have.

However if you are elderly and been brought up to treat GPs like royalty and expect them to do all the work then you will not take kindly to this new approach. Likewise, a GP might feel affronted by your arrogance - he or she shouldn't under the new patient-orientated NHS. But if you are unhappy with your treatment or the way you are being brushed under the carpet then I should change your GP. Consultants are sometimes even worse in the attitude department, but for the most part, you can be assured that if he or she is a specialist in respiratory medicine, they DO know more than you and you should make notes and ask only pertinent questions. Of course my web site aims to inform and hopefully encourage you to be an Expert Patient! Patients who have been on the course have reported back they have less severe symptoms, are more active, feel more in control of their life, have received practical help in how to cope with every day problems, have increased self-confidence and have been given simple exercises to do at home. You will also be provided with a very useful paperback on the "Self-management of Long Term Health Conditions" which I often refer to.Topics are wide ranging including healthy eating, exercises, symptom control and too many to mention here. The course helped me and I'm sure it will help you.

EXPERT PATIENTS PROGRAMME ONLINE

If you have a long-term health condition, are over 18 years old and live in England, you may be eligible to join EPP's 6 week
self-management course and research study online. You will learn skills needed in the day-to-day management of long term health conditions as well as maintaining or increasing your daily activities. The EPP Online course is an Internet-based version of the EPP self-management courses that are currently offered in England. With EPP Online, you can participate in the course at any time during each week. All that is asked is that you spend a total of two hours a week for six weeks, visiting the course and completing activities online. You choose the time that suits you. The programme is in its early stages, and so to help with the research study they will ask you to complete three questionnaires, one questionnaire at the time of enrollment, one in six months and one in a year. Each questionnaire will take just 20 - 30 minutes to complete. To find out more visit the EPP web site www.expertpatients.nhs.uk Copied from the BLF web site April 2006 There are new courses for CARERS as a part of the Expert Patients Programme - for details contact your local PALS - see FINDING OUT at top of this page.

It could help you to improve your quality of life, pain management, energy levels, use of services and stress levels (yours and those around you)