Therapeutic education tools for use in cardiology centres

I-Care^{1 2} is a national programme, established in 2004, which has developed therapeutic education units in cardiology centres in France. The programme aims to organise a training course in therapeutic education and develop standardised educational tools specifically for people with chronic heart failure.

Participating medical teams take a training course in therapeutic education. They also receive educational tools for people with heart failure created by I-Care, including an education assessment and advice on diet control, physical activity and medication.

What has it achieved?

Approximately 200 centres in France, Belgium and Luxembourg participated in I-Care and were helped to set up education units. Of these, 80% were still active in therapeutic education at the point of the evaluation (a very high rate, given that centres have to provide their own human and financial resources to participate).²

Participating centres use a mix of educational tools, including one-on-one and group teaching, delivered by a multidisciplinary team including specialist nurses, dietitians, cardiologists and physiotherapists.²

Links, references and key reading

1. Juillière Y, Trochu J-N, Jourdain P. Importance de l’éducation thérapeutique dans la prise en charge multidisciplinaire de l’insuffisance cardiaque. Annales de Cardiologie et d’Angéiologie 2006;55:11-16.
2. Juillière Y, Jourdain P, Roncalli J, et al. Therapeutic education unit for heart failure: Setting-up and difficulties. Initial evaluation of the I-CARE programme. Archives of Cardiovascular Disease 2009;102:19-27.