Symptom Management
When you have a long term condition your symptoms can appear when you least expect them to. You may feel your symptoms are often difficult to manage. Symptoms such as pain, tiredness and nausea can impact on everything you do and can make you feel frustrated, depressed and even overwhelmed.
Six steps to keeping well
These six steps have helped many people make big improvements in their health, symptoms and this will help improve how you are feeling:
Step 1: Learn as much as you can about your condition
Know and understand as much as you can about your health condition(s), what can make it better, or worse and what you can do to keep as well as possible.
Step 2: Red Flags
Talk with your healthcare team about what your red flags (early warning signs) are and what you should do. By knowing your red flags, having an action plan and taking action earlier, many people with conditions such as asthma, lung disease or heart problems (and many more) can avoid getting sicker and stay out of hospital
- Keep a pain/symptom diary to take to your doctor when your symptoms are not well controlled
- Look at other sections of this website for tips and ideas for managing tiredness, pain and more.
Step 3: Take your medications correctly
This is not always easy. Instructions can be confusing or we can forget what to do. Many people are on 5 or more medications a day and this can be hard work to take everything at the right time.
- Next time you see your healthcare team, take all your medications with you.
- Check what to take when and ask lots of questions until you are sure what to take when and anything to watch out for.
Step 4: Have your say and share in decision-making with your healthcare team.
You are an expert about yourself, your values, priorities and what will work for you and your family. Your healthcare team are experts about medical knowledge and what treatments are recommended, however not everything in medicine is black and white. By having a say and sharing in the decision making, you are more likely to receive the care, treatment and support that will work best for you, your whanau/family and situation.
Step 5: Build your support network to help manage the physical, emotional and social impact of living with ongoing health problems.
Having support from your family/whanau, neighbours, workmates and friends are all things that can make a big difference. Many people also find it helpful to talk with someone else who has the same or similar condition or read about their experiences. Find out more through the health topics (Support section) or visit the support network pages.
Step 6: Take control of your health - set out a plan for the next 12 months with your nurse or doctor.
We sometimes call this a care plan or wellness plan. Things to include could be:
- What's most important to you - if it's pain or tiredness, put this as number one.
- What other problems or issues need to be considered
- Goals - what do you want to achieve or would you like to be able to do differently?
- Action Points - identify one or two key actions you or someone else in your team can take to address the issue and help you reach your goal
- Follow up - who, what and when
- Monitor progress - keep a record, celebrate achieving your goals
- Review your plan and update as needed
