Calls have been made to improve the efficiency of healthcare services when treating patients with complex chronic illnesses.
The authors of a report published on bmj.com say that patients should not be burdened or overwhelmed when being treated for diseases.
And they called for patients and their carers to be given a greater say in how healthcare systems can be improved.
Professors Carl May, Victor Montori, and Frances Mair said: “Thinking seriously about the burden of treatment may help us begin to think about minimally disruptive medicine”.
They added that better “service provision and treatment” need to be put in place. They argue that current systems mean resources are wasted, patients are not as closely observed as they should be, and poor results are therefore inevitable.
The professors said that, in one case, a man being treated for heart failure spent the equivalent of one full day every two weeks making visits to specialist appointments, diagnostic tests and having treatment.
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