Self-management interventions for young people with chronic conditions: A systematic overview

- We provide a systematic overview of self-management interventions for chronically ill young people aged 7-25 years.
- Interventions' content, formats, underlying theories and outcomes used in evaluation studies were reviewed.
- Most studies aimed at medical management and were unclear about theoretical bases, while formats and used outcomes varied.
- Our overview may assist professionals in determining the breadth and focus of the support they provide.
- We present a content-based evaluation framework that may help researchers to select measures for evaluation studies.

ObjectiveTo provide a systematic overview of self-management interventions (SMI) for young people with chronic conditions with respect to content, formats, theories, and evaluated outcomes.MethodsEmbase, Medline, PsycINFO, Web-of-Science, CINAHL, and Cochrane were searched. Reviews' reference lists were scrutinized. Selected studies were: Original research articles in English published between 2003 and March 2014; about the evaluation of SMI for 7 to 25-year-olds with somatic chronic conditions/physical disabilities; with clear outcomes and intervention descriptions. The classification of medical, role and emotion management served to review content. Formats, theories, and evaluated outcomes were summarized.Results86 studies were reviewed. Most aimed at medical management and were unclear about theoretical bases. Although a variety of outcomes was evaluated and the distribution over self-management domains was quite unpredictable, outcomes conceptually related to specific content. A content-based framework for the evaluation of self-management interventions is presented.Conclusions and practice implications: SMI relate to self-management tasks and skill-building. Yet, conceptualizations of self-management support often remained unclear and content focuses predominantly on the medical domain, neglecting psycho-social challenges for chronically ill young people. Future evaluations should match outcomes/themes to content and characteristics. Our framework and overview of SMI characteristics and outcomes may assist clinicians in providing self-management support.