A square peg in a round hole? Approaches to incorporating lifestyle counselling into routine primary health care

Few studies have explored how lifestyle counselling can be integrated into routine practice for primary health care (PHC) clinicians working outside general practice. This paper describes the feasibility of models of lifestyle counselling developed for PHC clinicians working in community health services and the congruence with routine practice. Action research methods were used to develop and implement models of lifestyle counselling in three community health teams. Following a six-month implementation period, semi-structured interviews were conducted with a purposeful sample of participants (n = 30) to explore the appropriateness of implementing risk factor management models in practice. Models were considered appropriate if they fitted the clinician’s philosophy of practice, were relevant to existing work tasks, could easily be integrated into workflow and were perceived as being acceptable to the client. The approach to service delivery and team priorities were also important in influencing which models suited particular teams. Models of lifestyle counselling for PHC clinicians outside general practice should be tailored to the clinicians’ and teams’ way of working and thus may need to be discipline-specific. Engaging PHC clinicians and teams is important in developing models that are acceptable and feasible in everyday practice.