Long-term conditions are chronic illnesses that can limit lifestyle, such as diabetes, heart disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
There are 15.4 million people living with a long-term condition in England. Numbers are expected to rise due to an aging population and unhealthy lifestyle choices.
Message from National Director for Primary Care & Medical Adviser
"Delivering improvements for people with long term conditions isn't just about treating illness, it's about delivering personalised, responsive, holistic care in the full context of how people live their lives.
"Our journey to achieve this has started, our challenge is to continue to take it forward and the evidence compels us to do this."
Your health, your way – a guide to long term conditions and self care’ provides people with long term conditions the information they need about the choices, which should be available to them locally, to enable them to self care in partnership with health and social care professionals.
The National Service Framework for long-term conditions focuses on the needs of people with neurological conditions and brain or spinal injuries, calling for joint working across all agencies, including providers of transport, housing, employment, education, benefits and pensions, to support people to live independently. It also addresses issues relevant to a wide range of people with long-term conditions and disabilities.
This NSF was developed for a more devolved NHS. Instead of national targets, the NSF provides quality requirements for the inspection authorities - the Heathcare Commission and the Commission for Social Care Inspection - to use in measuring local progress. This NSF is intended to be used by patients and professionals.
This document updates the first compendium of information on LTCs, published in May 2004.
DMIT is a voluntary good practice tool that the NHS may wish to use to strengthen their approach to disease management.