Peer support in chronic health conditions

What you need to know• Peer support can be particularly helpful at the point of diagnosis or during periods of transition in health or life stages • Peer support can be accessed face to face, online, in clinical or non-clinical groups, or through activities • Clinicians can collaborate with peer support groups by signposting patients to peer support, offering to attend peer support sessions, and helping with meetingsMost people living with a long term condition spend only a small fraction of their time with healthcare professionals.Someone with diabetes, for example, will spend three hours a year with a healthcare professional on average, and the remaining 8757 hours caring for themselves. 1 Considering this limited time, and that 40-80% of medical information provided in health consultations is forgotten immediately, 2 additional access to means of support could allow people to address issues not dealt with in traditional clinical settings.3 Self-management alone can be tiring, isolating, overwhelming, and tough on mental health.Peer support offers a valuable way for people with chronic health conditions to learn to live with and manage the complexities of their condition day to day, giving them the confidence, knowledge, and support to do this.4 5 This article offers an overview of peer support, its place in long term condition management, and tips for discussing it with patients. What is peer support?Peer support is the connection of two or more people with shared lived experiences.It can take the shape of spontaneous or arranged one-to-one interactions, buddy programmes, or a group setting (table 1).Meetings can occur face to face (eg, coaching and information sharing), virtually (blogs or online communities, following tags or specific members of the community, or by accessing group talks or podcasts), or in formal groups (self-management education, semi-structured support groups, group consultations/clinics).