Quality of life and self-monitoring: CVD prevention in practice. The role of patient organizations in CVD prevention

Engaged patients with a good knowledge of their own disease are open to prevention and are also active in managing their own disease. However, high blood pressure and other cardiovascular risk factors are frequently viewed not as a disease but merely as one of the trappings of age. As there is no mental trauma, there is less motivation for self-help measures than for symptomatic diseases. Patients' organizations and/or self-help groups are for many patients a refuge where they can learn more about dealing with their own disease and become experts in their own cases. From the point of view of prevention, these institutions may not be in a position to provide similarly effective services of this kind, even if blood pressure is a risk factor highly suitable for self-monitoring.
Based on existing experiences, diabetic patients and/or anticoagulated patients who carry out self-monitoring and/or self-management are more prepared to regularly check their blood pressure at home than patients without any manifest disease.
Media information campaigns on the ‘consequences of untreated high blood pressure’ in tandem with the call to take a little better care of oneself would be a step towards self-monitoring of blood pressure (‘You only need to change your habits slightly; but do it for the sake of your quality of life’).

Christian Schaefer: International Self-Monitoring Association of Oral Anticoagulated Patients (ISMAAP), Geneva, Switzerland, c/o Etude R. Dagon, Rue du Marché 12-14, CH- 1204, GenevaCorresponding author. E-mail address: information@ismaap.orgEuropean Heart Journal Supplements (2007) 9 (Supplement B), B42-B44.