The impact of health and wellness coaching on patient-important outcomes in chronic illness care: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Kasey R Boehmer, Neri A Álvarez-Villalobos, Suzette Barakat and 12 others
PMID 37738790WHAT IT FOUND
Coaching for adults with chronic conditions improved quality of life, self-efficacy, and depressive symptoms only short term; anxiety did not improve.
The evidence was too uncertain to expect lasting change.
Key findings
01Health and wellness coaching was associated with improved quality of life at 3 months but not at 6, 12, or 18 months.
02Coaching improved self-efficacy at 1.5 months and depressive symptoms at 3, 6, and 12 months, but did not improve anxiety.
03The certainty for most outcomes was very low or low because of high risk of bias, heterogeneity, and imprecision.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The certainty for most outcomes was very low or low because of high risk of bias, heterogeneity, and imprecision. The review included studies regardless of risk of bias, so low-quality trials could influence the pooled results. Only English-language randomized trials were included. Chronic conditions, coaching delivery, coaches, outcome scales, and follow-up times varied widely. There were too few studies to examine effects within specific chronic condition subgroups. Few studies reported long-term follow-up, so lasting benefit is unclear. The review assumed different self-report scales measured the same construct. Two studies were noticeably different: one showed quality of life improvement at 3 months but a negative effect at 6 months, and one enrolled patients with severe depression and may have driven depression improvement. Intervention capacity constructs were inferred from reported characteristics, and reporting was often insufficient.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that health and wellness coaching is a proven long-term treatment for chronic illness or mental health symptoms. The benefits were short term, anxiety did not improve, and the certainty for most outcomes was very low or low.