Community-Supported Self-Management
Throughout nearly 50 years of community service, Conard House has been developing resources and innovative approaches in support of an individual's goals of self-defined recovery and a healthy life.
Self-management is the positive effort of an individual to seek, access, oversee and participate in his or her health care to optimize health, prevent complications, control symptoms, and minimize the intrusion of illness into a healthy productive life.
Supported self-management is the collaborative effort of an individual living with one or more chronic conditions and each member of his or her health care team. Our goal is to shift the focus of care from an overemphasis on (formal) diagnosis, (prescriptive) treatment and (passive) compliance to:
- the positive effort of the individual to seek, access, oversee and participate in healthy behavior, and
- the positive effort of team members to support the individual's daily decisions that improve bio-psycho-social functioning and overall stability.
Community supported self-management is the social contract between individuals with chronic health conditions, health care providers, employers, landlords, friends and family that validates and encourages self-advocacy and self-management among health care consumers and confers the value of healing and recovery in the daily lives of everyone touched by chronic illness.
In My Own Words
"My philosophy in life: you're never dead till you're dead, you're never too old to progress and go forward. If you can get up out of bed, you can do something productive to help yourself. I've been able to help myself with Conard's help with my therapy and family. I've been able to help myself, and how I help myself is a gift from God."
Client, 2008