Effects of a hospital‐based education programme on self‐care behaviour, care dependency and quality of life in patients with heart failure – a randomised controlled trial

Aims and objectives To evaluate the effects of a nurse‐led, hospital‐based heart failure specific education session with a three‐month telephone follow‐up on self‐care behaviour, care dependency and quality of life for patients with chronic heart failure. Background Patient education in patients with heart failure is able to promote heart failure‐specific self‐care, to reduce mortality, morbidity and rehospitalisation rates and to enhance quality of life, especially if heart failure education is embedded in a multidisciplinary approach. Evidence of the effect of a nurse‐led self‐care education, quality of life and care dependency in addition to standard medical treatment in Germany is lacking. Design Nonblinded, prospective, single‐centre, randomised controlled trial. Method Sixty‐four patients were allocated either to the intervention group or to the control group. Patients in the intervention group received education about heart failure self‐care with a consecutive telephone follow‐up over three months in addition to standard medical treatment. Patients in the control group received standard medical treatment only. Results Data of 110 patients (58 in the intervention group and 52 in the control group) with a mean age of 62 years and mean left ventricular ejection fraction of 28·2% could be analysed. Self‐care education had a significant influence on overall heart failure self‐care but not on quality of life and care dependency. Conclusion A single education session with a consecutive telephone follow‐up is able to improve overall self‐care behaviours but not quality of life. Care dependency was not influenced by the education session. Relevance to clinical practice The easy to implement and short educational intervention has a positive effect on self‐care behaviour for patients with heart failure. However, there was no effect on quality of life and care dependency. To improve quality of life and to influence care dependency, different measures have to be applied.