Patients who live with chronic physical illness are often the best judges of what they need to manage their condition. One of the goals of the NHS is to improve quality of life in patients with chronic conditions, and the concept of the expert patient - a patient who is empowered with information and contributes ideas to help in their treatment and care - is seen as a way to help to achieve this goal. This book is designed to provide a comprehensive overview of self-management in chronic physical illness. It is intended to provide readers with the theoretical and conceptual background to self-management, as well as examining issues to do with the delivery of self-management interventions in chronic illness and systematically reviewing the efficacy and effectiveness of these interventions in a range of different chronic conditions. The readership for the book is intended to be a wide range of health care professionals dealing with individuals with chronic conditions. It will appeal in particular to those who are engaged in self-management interventions or academic researchers interested in these interventions. In addition postgraduate students in health and clinical psychology as well as doctors, nurses and other health care professionals in training are likely to use such a book.