الفهرس | Only 14 pages are availabe for public view |
Abstract A global rise in life expectancy and an increase in cultural and environmental risks such as smoking, unhealthy diet, lack of physical activity, and air pollution are associated with an epidemic of chronic illness. Also, rapid epidemiological transition globally has witnessed a rising prevalence of major chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, obesity, chronic respiratory diseases and cancers over the past 30 years. This in turn, has led to the massive burden of treating complications in secondary care, burden to the patients and their families with regards to morbidity and premature death, and burden to the country with regards to premature loss of human capital. Development of an integrated approach that will target all major common risk factors of cardiovascular diseases (CVD), diabetes mellitus (DM), cancer and chronic respiratory diseases is the most cost-effective way to prevent and control them. An integrated approach responds not only to the need of intervention on major common risk factors with the aim of reducing premature mortality and morbidity of chronic non-communicable diseases, but also the need to integrate primary, secondary and tertiary prevention, health promotion, and related programs across sectors and different disciplines. Persons with comorbid chronic diseases experience a wide range of barriers to self-care, including several that are specifically related to having multiple medical conditions. Self-management interventions may need to address interactions between |