Page: Self Care

This statement underscores the importance and benefits of self care. It recognises both the personal responsibility of patients to enhance and maintain their own health and well-being, and the responsibility of pharmacists to support patients in self care activities. Appropriate support by pharmacists will assist patients in improved or maintained health, greater health self-efficacy, and higher economic efficiency.

This reference paper reviews the current state of consumer interest in health care and presents a collection of evidence of pharmacy services related to self-care and the value that pharmacists bring to health care systems in this way. It lays out the drivers of self-care and profound changes in the way health care systems operate.

Women are the non-professional caregivers closest to healthcare professionals and are often the ones who visit pharmacies and assume responsibilities for health in the household. In general, women tend to seek treatment and visit doctors or pharmacies (and pharmacists) more frequently than men do. It is often the woman who encourages family members to visit a healthcare professional and who makes sure they take medicines and understand the treatment.

Pharmacists should support women in these emerging roles, because medicines are like a double-edged sword — of great benefit if used correctly, but capable of causing harm if used incorrectly. In this reference document, attention is paid to the fact that women as informal caregivers considerably lighten the load of the healthcare labour force, often playing a crucial and underappreciated role in providing healthcare to families and communities.

The objective of this statement is to describe the united role and intention of the pharmacy profession and industry in delivering solutions to people to facilitate self-care and in engaging with stakeholders including governments to further develop self-care as a core pillar of sustainable healthcare systems. This statement considers regulated or evidence-based selfcare products designed to promote good health, or to prevent and/or to treat ill health through self-care, and to achieve positive outcomes for people’s health. In this context, pharmacists play a key role when assisting individuals as they can provide unbiased, evidence based advice and information about regulated or evidence-based self-care products and services available.

The aim of this toolkit is to equip pharmacists with knowledge in general nutrition and general weight management strategies so they can play an increased role in the communities they serve and support other healthcare providers involved in their patients’ care, including general and specialist physicians, nurses, dieticians, nutritionists, dentists etc., and to be proactive in facilitating discussions about nutrition and physical activity with their patients. Pharmacists across the world are already taking steps to promote healthy lifestyles among their patients through a variety of innovative initiatives, ranging from educational campaigns to more direct patient counselling strategies and programmes.