Assessment of Health Education in The Prevention of Non-Communicable Chronic Disease Complications: Systematic Review

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of health education in the prevention of non-communicable chronic diseases.
 
 Method: This is a systematic literature review, guided by the question "In patients with non-communicable chronic diseases (NCDs), does health education compared to conventional clinical practice contribute to the prevention of complications?". The selected articles were extracted from the following databases: Biblioteca Virtual em Saúde (BVS), National Library of Medicine (PUBMED), Scientific Electronic Library Online (Scielo), Regional Online Information System for Scientific Journals from Latin America, the Caribbean, Spain, and Portugal (Latindex), and Cochrane Library. Randomized clinical trials in English, Portuguese, and Spanish from the last 10 years with full-text availability were chosen as eligibility criteria, resulting in a final sample of 10 articles.
 
 Results: Positive findings were observed regarding the complications of non-communicable diseases, such as: improvement in quality of life and cardiac anxiety scores; reduction in anxiety and depression; increased therapeutic adherence, diabetic foot care, physical activity stimulation, adoption of healthy eating habits, blood glucose self-monitoring and health literacy improvement; reduction in systolic and diastolic blood pressure; improvement in self-management of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus; overall prevention of NCDs; promotion of motivation for behavioral change in smoking patients, and improvement in renal function with a considerable decrease in serum creatinine and a stable glomerular filtration rate. Implementing educational programs can be helpful in enhancing the quality of life in chronic diseases.
 
 Conclusion: Despite the limitation resulting from the diversity of interventions, the consistency in results highlights the beneficial impact of educational approaches, calling for attention from healthcare professionals and public policymakers to expand the use of these strategies in the management of NCDs.