Advancing towards the implementation of patient-centred care in Chile: An opportunity to effectively practice shared decision-making.

In Chile, local normative and guidelines place patient-centred care (PCC) as a desirable means and outcome for each level of health care. Thus, a definition of PCC is provided, and for the first time shared decision-making (SDM) is included as an intended practice. During the past five years the country has shown progress on the implementation of PCC. A large pilot study was conducted in one of the Metropolitan Health Services, and now the health authority is committed to escalate a PCC strategy nationwide. From the practice domain, most of the work is being placed on the training of health professionals. Patients' preparation for the clinical encounter is scarce, thereby limiting their potential to participate in their care. At the research domain, the country shows a strengthened agenda that has advanced from a diagnostic phase (including the exploration from social sciences) to a purposeful stage which involves the development of training programs, patient decision aids, international collaborations, and other PCC interventions. The country is now positioned to secure new initiatives to empower patients and allow them to take an active role, as a key component of PCC and SDM.

Patient-centred care and shared decision making in Chile: Rising momentum for progress and implementation in clinical practice.

The Chilean legislation establishes that patients have rights and responsibilities in regards to their healthcare. This is an important statement as it declares that people must be informed and become actively involved in their care; meanwhile, the health system needs to coordinate the provision of personalised and effective services. Although patient-centred care (PCC) and shared decision making (SDM) are relatively new concepts in Chile, the country is experiencing an interesting political momentum to create more interventions to achieve PCC and SDM and explore clinical implementation. Currently, research efforts in Chile have focused on better understanding the state of the art related to both concepts and how new clinical approaches could help to operationalize them.

Shared decision making in Chile: supportive policies and research initiatives.

WHAT ABOUT POLICY REGARDING SDM? Since 1999, there has been a small but growing interest by academics, the government, and society as a whole in strengthening patients' and professionals' involvement in shared decision making (SDM). Two governmental policy documents that indicate support for SDM are (1) Health Reform in 2003 and (2) Sanitary Objectives 2011-2020, which includes a brief section on client participation and SDM. WHAT ABOUT TOOLS - DECISION SUPPORT FOR PATIENTS? Research by Chilean academics has highlighted the patients' desire to participate in health decisions and effective approaches for enhancing health professionals' skills in interprofessional SDM; however, little has been done to support this need and the work is centralised in only one academic institution. Decision support tools and coaching interventions are limited to patients considering decisions about managing type 2 diabetes. WHAT ABOUT PROFESSIONAL INTEREST AND IMPLEMENTATION? Although there is increasing attention to studying patients' participation and involvement on their healthcare, little has been studied in relation to professionals' interest in SDM. As well, there are significant challenges for implementation of a country-wide SDM policy. WHAT DOES THE FUTURE LOOK LIKE? The future looks promising given the new health policies, local Chilean research projects, and international initiatives. Collaboration between health professionals, academics, and government policy makers, with public involvement needs to be strengthened in order to promote concrete strategies to implement SDM in Chile.