RN: I’d like to discuss with you your theoretical knowledge on TPE before you take on your training. Therefore, first, would you tell me what the TPE aims at?

TN: Sure. It’s about providing patients with an overview of what TPE is.

RN: Good. But according to the World Health Organization, TPE helps patients acquire and maintain the skills they need to manage their disease in order to have the best possible quality of life (QoL). In this sense, it is also about the scope and targets of TPE, who provides it, and how it is organized and coordinated. This being said, let me ask you what activities can be included in the patient’s QoL?

TN: I guess daily routine, in general, I mean social and professional life. And maybe providing oral or written information and advice about prevention.

RN: Yes, but not only that. In other words, just providing oral or written information, and advice about prevention, is not TPE. Actually, managing one’s life covers organized activities, including psychosocial support, designed to make patients fully aware about their disease, and to inform them about care, hospital organization and procedures, and health- and disease-related behaviors. This would help patients and their families, or family caregivers, understand and deal with the disease and its treatment together, in order to maintain or improve the quality of life of the persons involved.

TN: Ok. And what does TPE target, then?

RN: The goals are the acquisition, acceptance and maintenance, by the patient, of self-care and safety skills. This is what we call the therapeutic alliance that also includes the mobilization or acquisition of all life skills, or what we call the bio-psycho-social skills. In this sense, a TPE program must be individually tailored, with outcome assessments.

TN: But then again, who should benefit from TPE? I mean any patient with any health condition?

RN: Sorry for not having specified that TPE targets patients with chronic diseases. Therefore, it should be offered shortly after announcing the diagnosis of a chronic disease. It may be offered during the course of the disease, if it has not already been offered. In this sense, it should be proposed not only to anyone with a chronic disease, regardless of their age or the type, stage and progression of the disease, but also to the patient’s close relations, if they are willing and if the patient wants to involve them in the management of the disease.

TN: And as nurses, are we allowed to propose TPE to a patient and/or a family caregiver?

RN: Of course. I mean any healthcare provider who is trained in TPE, but it would also better be offered by involving a multi-disciplinary or multi-professional team in order to implement the best possible customized program.

TN: So, I guess any patient who also presents psychological, social and mental comorbidities should benefit from TPE.

RN: Yes, and this is what we call a patient-centered, holistic, and evidence-based approach for a high-quality TPE.