Patient Perspectives on Quality of Life - Blog 4

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal by Laura Landro entitled “The Simple Idea That is Transforming Health Care” focuses on the issue of quality of life for health care patients. In the article, Landro purports that a patient’s perception of quality of life can be swayed when he or she is focused on smaller, more specific goals for treatment. Lofty goals, such as reducing one’s cholesterol or blood pressure in an effort to treat diseases, can be stressful on a patient. When such a large task is ahead of a person, the efforts to treat symptoms can be daunting and seem impossible to accomplish.

New theories suggest that counselors who ask personal questions to patients relating to the patient’s condition, happiness, and daily struggles can have a great impact on that patient’s quality of life (Landro, 2012). In fact, with the advice of counselors on how to improve one’s life on a daily basis and how to cope with symptoms of a disease, patients have reported feeling less stressed about their conditions and struggles with treatment management. The reasoning follows that patients are daunted by seemingly innocuous tasks such as lowering blood pressure, but are better able to handle personal goals, such as performing better at work or being able to spend more time with family.

The key to this strategy is following up with patients. Unlike doctors, counselors can spend more time going over goals with patients. While a patient may see a doctor a few times a year, he or she can meet with a counselor on an ongoing basis. Many experts believe that such follow-ups are vital to helping a patient meet treatment goals (Landro, 2012). Counseling programs can help patients keep track of their symptoms and can answer questions that one might have regarding things like possible drug interactions or how to handle certain aspects of family life as related to one’s illness.

Lawmakers seem to agree with this idea, as the Affordable Care Act of 2010 included $3 billion of funding to help patients improve their quality of life throughout care (Landro, 2012). Instead of solely focusing on illness treatments, a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute will use more personal measures when searching for new treatments. This will be one of the first institutes of its kind to completely incorporate patient-perceived quality of life into treatment research.

Hopefully further research can provide more in-depth insight into the benefits of patient counseling. While it has been known that patients who are followed up are readmitted less, there has not been enough research to say for certain that it is due to patient counselors (Landro, 2012). With the country’s recent move toward a focus on preventive care instead of simply treating a patient’s symptoms, counseling can be a relatively cost-effective way to keep patients on track with his or her treatment. 

Landro, L. (2012, April 16). The simple idea that is transforming health care. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304450004577275911370551798.html