Common symptoms in the community: understanding the public's responses to inform the development of interventions. (360G-Wellcome-078176_Z_05_Z)

Recent UK government policy has advocated more extensive use of primary care teams, including nurses and pharmacists, for the management of common ailments, as well as promoting self-care of symptoms indicative of self-limiting illness. We do not currently know how the public is responding to these strategies or what influences their own management decisions. The aim of this research is to determine patterns of common symptoms in the community, and understand how the public responds to them, in order to enhance appropriate and effective management of common symptoms. The first phase of the research will be a population-based postal survey which will determine the patterns of common symptoms in the community, identify how people currently manage their symptoms, and identify factors associated with different patterns of management. The second phase will be a discrete choice experiment which will investigate the relative importance of different factors influencing management decisions and the trade-offs people make when deciding how to manage their symptoms. The final phase will be a literature review of primary care-based interventions previously used to manage common symptoms. The work will lead to the development of interventions to be used in primary care to optimise appropriate health care.