Listening to Patients and Caregivers: How Lived Experience Can Inform Lifestyle Medicine Resources in Viet Nam
LIFESTYLE MEDICINE IN VIET NAMHEALTH EQUITY & PLANETARY HEALTH
Listening to Patients and Caregivers: How Lived Experience Can Inform Lifestyle Medicine Resources in Viet Nam
Primary category: Lifestyle Medicine in Viet Nam
Secondary category: Health Equity & Planetary Health
Article type: VLMA Perspective
Last reviewed: October 22, 2026
A health education resource can be scientifically accurate and still leave someone unsure about what the information means for their everyday life.
A recommendation may contain unfamiliar medical terms, describe foods that are difficult to find locally, or assume that people have the time and resources to attend regular appointments. Healthcare professionals may understand the scientific reasoning, while the people receiving the information struggle to see how it relates to their circumstances.
Sometimes the difficulty is not the evidence itself. It is how that evidence has been explained, what the explanation assumes, or what it leaves unsaid.
People living with health conditions and those who support them may recognize these gaps because they encounter the practical challenges of following health recommendations outside the clinical setting.
Their experiences cannot, on their own, establish whether an intervention is safe or effective. They can, however, provide valuable insight into whether educational information is understandable, relevant, respectful, and realistic for the people expected to use it.
The Vietnam Lifestyle Medicine Alliance (VLMA) develops Knowledge & Evidence resources to support professional learning, scientific discussion, and the responsible development of Lifestyle Medicine in Viet Nam.
Our primary focus is professional education and knowledge exchange. Nevertheless, the information we publish may influence how healthcare professionals explain lifestyle-related care, communicate with patients, or understand the difficulties people encounter when trying to make changes.
As our resources develop, we see value in considering how patients' and caregivers' experiences could help us recognize what our publications explain well, what they overlook, and where greater clarity or local relevance may be needed.
This article presents that perspective and the principles we hope to develop. It does not imply that VLMA has already established a formal patient advisory group, patient engagement program, or co-design process involving patients and caregivers.
What Lived Experience Can Help Us Understand
Healthcare professionals and people receiving care often approach the same information from different perspectives.
A clinician may focus on whether a recommendation is scientifically supported, clinically appropriate, and consistent with professional guidance.
The person receiving the recommendation may have other questions. What does this mean for me? Can I understand the instructions? Is the suggested activity realistic within my daily routine? What if I cannot afford the recommended foods or access the services mentioned? When should I ask a healthcare professional for additional advice?
These questions do not necessarily indicate disagreement with the recommendation. They may reveal information that has not been adequately explained.
Consider a hypothetical educational resource discussing physical activity for adults living with chronic conditions.
The scientific content may be accurate, but the examples might assume that everyone can walk comfortably, has access to a safe outdoor environment, or can arrange time for exercise during the day.
Someone with mobility limitations may notice that the material does not sufficiently explain the importance of individualized assessment. A person working long hours may find the examples difficult to relate to daily life. A caregiver may recognize that transportation, communication, or physical assistance could influence whether the suggested activities are practical.
These observations can help identify where a resource needs clearer wording, more appropriate examples, or a better explanation of its limitations.
They do not determine which intervention is safe or effective for an individual. That remains a matter for relevant scientific evidence and appropriate clinical assessment.
For VLMA, the distinction is important. Lived experience can contribute knowledge about how information is understood and used without being expected to provide clinical conclusions beyond what that experience can establish.
Making Health Information Understandable and Usable
Health literacy is often described in terms of a person's ability to find, understand, evaluate, and use health information.
However, it is not solely an individual responsibility.
The World Health Organization's health literacy guidance, updated in December 2025, emphasizes that health literacy is also influenced by organizational structures and the availability of resources that enable people to access, understand, and use information.
This perspective is particularly relevant to organizations that develop educational materials.
A reader should not need advanced medical knowledge to understand the main message of a resource intended for patients or the general public. If important information is difficult to understand, the problem may lie partly in how it has been written or presented.
At the same time, a document intended for healthcare professionals may appropriately contain technical terminology, detailed scientific interpretation, and clinical considerations.
VLMA's Knowledge & Evidence resources are primarily designed for professional audiences. Some may nevertheless be read by patients, caregivers, students, or members of the public.
Public accessibility does not automatically make a professional resource suitable for use as a patient instruction sheet.
If VLMA develops resources specifically intended for patients or caregivers in the future, those materials would require additional attention to language, accessibility, organization, and the information people need to understand and discuss with their healthcare professionals.
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's Health Literacy Universal Precautions Toolkit, Third Edition, provides useful guidance on making health information easier to understand and act upon.
The toolkit emphasizes clear communication, reducing unnecessary complexity, confirming understanding, and helping people navigate healthcare information and services.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Clear Communication Index also offers a structured approach to assessing the clarity of public health materials, including their main messages, language, information design, numerical information, and communication of risk.
Importantly, CDC notes that communication assessment tools cannot replace testing materials with their intended audience.
These resources were developed in the United States. Their principles can inform VLMA's editorial thinking, but they should not be treated as automatically validated for every Vietnamese population or healthcare setting.
For us, the central lesson is that scientific accuracy and understandable communication are both important. Making a resource easier to read should not compromise the evidence, while scientific complexity should not become an excuse for explanations that are unnecessarily difficult to follow.
When Educational Examples Do Not Reflect Everyday Life in Viet Nam
One challenge in communicating Lifestyle Medicine is that scientific recommendations are often easier to describe than to apply.
Information about healthy eating may not adequately consider household budgets, food availability, working arrangements, or family responsibilities.
Recommendations about sleep may overlook shift work, caregiving duties, or living conditions that make regular sleep schedules difficult.
Physical activity resources may assume access to safe spaces, adequate mobility, or sufficient time for leisure.
These circumstances are relevant in Viet Nam, where living and working conditions vary considerably across households and communities.
Patient and caregiver perspectives may help identify when educational examples fail to reflect those differences.
For instance, a resource might explain evidence-based nutritional principles using ingredients or preparation methods that are unfamiliar to some Vietnamese households.
The underlying scientific information may remain valid, but the examples may not help readers connect that information with foods they regularly purchase, prepare, or eat.
Feedback from people responsible for everyday meals could help identify which explanations are unclear or impractical.
The appropriate response would be to reconsider the educational presentation while maintaining the scientific integrity of the recommendations.
Patient or caregiver preferences should not independently determine nutritional guidance. They can help qualified professionals develop clearer and more culturally relevant examples consistent with available evidence.
The same principle applies to information about healthcare access.
A publication may recommend follow-up with an appropriate professional without acknowledging that service availability, referral arrangements, travel requirements, and costs can vary.
Someone familiar with those difficulties may recognize that the resource needs a more careful explanation.
That does not mean VLMA should arrange individualized referrals, provide clinical instructions, or guarantee access to services.
It means that educational materials should avoid making assumptions about resources that may not be available to everyone.
This is where lived experience can contribute to the relevance of professional knowledge resources without replacing the scientific basis of their content.
Caregivers Bring a Different Perspective
Caregivers can recognize challenges that may not be apparent to the people preparing educational materials.
In many Vietnamese households, family members help support people living with chronic conditions, older adults, and those requiring assistance with daily activities.
These arrangements vary. Some people receive substantial support from relatives, while others live independently, rely on friends or paid caregivers, or have limited assistance available.
Caregivers may help prepare meals, organize appointments, arrange transportation, communicate with healthcare professionals, or support daily routines.
Through these responsibilities, they may encounter practical difficulties that educational materials do not adequately address.
For example, a resource may encourage regular follow-up without considering that transportation depends on another person's work schedule.
Written instructions may assume that the person receiving care can independently read, understand, and remember detailed information when additional communication support may be needed.
A caregiver may also notice wording that is difficult to explain to an older family member or identify a situation where a resource does not adequately distinguish general educational information from circumstances requiring professional assessment.
These observations can help improve clarity and usability.
However, patients' and caregivers' perspectives should not be treated as interchangeable.
A caregiver may understand practical support needs while holding preferences that differ from those of the person receiving care.
The person's wishes, dignity, autonomy, and lawful decision-making rights must remain central. Caregiver involvement does not automatically authorize someone to disclose another person's health information, speak on their behalf, or make decisions that belong to them.
Appropriate involvement depends on the person's wishes and circumstances, including any relevant legal representation or decision-making arrangements.
Caregivers also have needs and limitations of their own. Their health, available time, financial circumstances, and other responsibilities may affect the support they can reasonably provide.
Educational resources should avoid assuming that families can offer unlimited unpaid care or that every recommended activity can simply be transferred to a caregiver.
For VLMA, listening to caregivers should help us recognize these realities while respecting the independence and preferences of people receiving care.
Turning Feedback Into More Useful Resources
Feedback becomes particularly valuable when it identifies something specific that can be examined and, where appropriate, improved.
A general comment that an article is helpful or confusing may provide an initial indication. More detailed feedback can show which part of the material creates difficulty and why.
A reader might identify an unfamiliar term that has not been explained, a paragraph containing too many technical ideas, or a main message that is difficult to find.
Another might notice that an illustration does not reflect a familiar situation in Viet Nam or that a resource assumes access to services that are not available in their community.
These concerns may require different responses.
A confusing term may need a clearer definition. An overly complicated explanation may benefit from better organization or simpler wording.
An unfamiliar example may need to be reconsidered by someone with suitable subject-matter expertise.
A potentially missing safety consideration would require scientific review rather than an editorial change based only on reader preference.
Consider a hypothetical VLMA resource intended to help healthcare professionals communicate lifestyle-related recommendations to adults with chronic conditions.
The resource contains scientifically supported information, but some examples assume that patients can attend frequent follow-up appointments, read lengthy written instructions, and independently organize changes to daily routines.
If people with relevant lived experience were invited to comment on the resource, they might identify difficulties that were not apparent during its preparation.
One person might explain that a particular term is difficult to understand. Another might point out that the suggested follow-up arrangement is unrealistic for someone who must travel a considerable distance to obtain care.
A caregiver might notice that the resource assumes family assistance without acknowledging the time or resources required.
VLMA could use these observations to consider whether the professional resource needs clearer explanations about variability in service access, communication support, or individual circumstances.
If a separate patient-facing explanation were developed, it might benefit from simpler language and more familiar examples.
Any substantive scientific changes would still require appropriate professional judgment and evidence review.
A person's difficulty following a recommendation does not establish that the intervention is ineffective. Similarly, positive feedback about a revised resource does not demonstrate improved health outcomes.
The value of the feedback would lie in identifying communication barriers and informing appropriate improvements to the material.
This example is illustrative. It does not describe an existing VLMA patient consultation, co-design project, or evaluated educational intervention.
Listening to Feedback Is Not the Same as Co-Design
Organizations can involve people in developing health information in several ways.
They may receive comments on published materials, ask intended readers whether a document is understandable, invite people to review a draft, or involve contributors more extensively in planning and developing resources.
These forms of participation are related, but they are not equivalent.
Receiving feedback does not automatically constitute co-design.
Someone may identify a problem without having an ongoing role in the decisions that follow. A consultation may provide useful information without giving participants responsibility for shaping the final product.
The World Health Organization's 2023 Framework for Meaningful Engagement of People Living with Noncommunicable Diseases, and Mental Health and Neurological Conditions provides useful guidance on moving beyond symbolic participation.
The framework emphasizes respect, dignity, equity, the value of lived experience, and meaningful opportunities for individuals to influence decisions affecting them.
Its primary purpose is to support WHO and Member States in strengthening participation in the development of relevant policies, programs, and services.
It is not a mandatory editorial standard for VLMA, and referring to it does not establish that VLMA has implemented a comparable engagement process.
Nevertheless, its principles provide a useful reference.
If VLMA develops structured opportunities for patient or caregiver feedback, the purpose of the activity should be clear. Participants should understand what they are being asked to contribute, how their perspectives may be considered, and what influence they can reasonably expect to have.
We should not describe an invitation to provide comments as an opportunity to shape decisions if there is no intention or capacity to consider those comments.
Where appropriate and feasible, contributors could also receive information about whether their feedback informed revisions.
Meaningful engagement involves more than collecting people's stories. It requires respectful participation and transparency about how decisions are made.
At the same time, VLMA should not promise a permanent advisory group, a formal co-design program, or representative patient participation unless the necessary arrangements have actually been established.
Recognizing Whose Experiences May Be Missing
One limitation of informal feedback is that the people most able to contribute may not represent everyone who could benefit from better health information.
A person who is comfortable using digital technology may find it easy to read an article and submit comments online.
Someone with limited internet access, visual or hearing impairments, difficulty reading medical information, or unfamiliarity with professional terminology may have fewer opportunities to respond.
People facing financial hardship, disability, demanding work schedules, or substantial caregiving responsibilities may also find participation difficult.
This matters because some of the people who encounter the greatest barriers to accessing or using health information may be among the least visible in feedback gathered through a professional website.
A resource can receive positive comments from highly engaged readers while remaining difficult to understand or use for others.
For VLMA, feedback should therefore be interpreted with attention to who provided it and whose perspectives may be absent.
An online comment from a healthcare professional, feedback from a caregiver, and an account from someone living with a chronic condition may each identify a useful issue. None should automatically be treated as representative of an entire population.
A small number of carefully considered perspectives can help reveal problems, but they cannot establish how widespread those problems are across Viet Nam.
If more structured engagement becomes feasible, considerations such as language, disability access, digital access, geographical differences, age, and educational background may help shape an inclusive approach.
This does not mean that every consultation must become a nationally representative study.
It means being transparent about the limitations of the feedback received and avoiding conclusions that go beyond what the information can support.
The purpose is to make resources more relevant and accessible, not to suggest that all patients or caregivers share the same experiences.
Respecting People Who Share Personal Experiences
Inviting someone to describe a health-related experience creates responsibilities.
A person may disclose information about illness, disability, financial circumstances, family relationships, or experiences with healthcare services.
Even when the purpose is only to improve an educational resource, the account may contain sensitive personal information.
Participation should be voluntary and based on a clear understanding of what the activity involves.
People should not feel pressured to disclose more than they wish, particularly when an invitation is associated with a professional or healthcare institution from which they receive care.
If VLMA develops a structured feedback activity, contributors should understand who is collecting information, why it is being collected, how it may be used, and whether any part of their comments could be published.
They should also understand that providing feedback does not establish a clinical relationship with VLMA or guarantee that a particular editorial change will be made.
Respectful engagement means listening without dismissing someone's account simply because it differs from what others have experienced.
It also requires recognizing that people may not wish to discuss distressing experiences in detail.
Where participation involves substantial time or preparation, reasonable arrangements concerning accessibility, scheduling, support, or reimbursement may be considered when appropriate, lawful, and feasible.
Any such arrangements should be transparent and should not create pressure to provide favorable comments.
Personal accounts should not be used primarily as promotional testimonials or presented in ways that imply endorsement without appropriate authorization.
These principles describe how we would want to approach future engagement, not a claim that a formal VLMA patient participation program is already operating.
Protecting Privacy and Confidentiality in Viet Nam
A person may be identifiable even when their name is not included in a published account.
Details about age, occupation, location, family relationships, unusual medical circumstances, or specific healthcare experiences may allow others to recognize them.
Removing direct identifiers does not necessarily eliminate the risk of re-identification.
For VLMA, privacy protection should begin by avoiding the unnecessary collection of personal and clinical information.
Feedback about an educational resource may often be obtained without requesting a diagnosis, medical history, treatment record, or detailed account of family circumstances.
Questions about whether a paragraph is understandable or an example is familiar generally do not require access to identifiable patient records.
Where personal data are collected or processed, VLMA must comply with the applicable Vietnamese legal framework, including the Law on Personal Data Protection No. 91/2025/QH15 and Decree No. 356/2025/ND-CP, both effective from January 1, 2026.
Depending on the activity, compliance may involve establishing an appropriate legal basis for processing, informing individuals about the purpose of data collection, limiting information to what is necessary, defining access responsibilities, and applying suitable security, storage, retention, and disclosure safeguards.
Other professional confidentiality, institutional, and ethical obligations may also apply.
Particular care is necessary before publishing an identifiable personal story, photograph, recorded voice, or quotation.
Agreement to provide feedback should not automatically be treated as permission to publish it in an identifiable form.
Public use of personal information requires an appropriate legal basis and any necessary permissions, with clear information about the intended use.
Hypothetical examples or carefully constructed composite scenarios may sometimes explain an educational problem without revealing identifiable experiences.
However, such examples should be clearly presented as illustrative, not as documented accounts from real individuals.
VLMA should also avoid inviting people to submit identifiable medical records, case histories, or confidential institutional information through ordinary website contact channels.
These boundaries help protect both the people who may wish to contribute and the professional credibility of VLMA.
Feedback on Educational Materials Is Not Automatically Clinical Research
The purpose of an activity matters when determining its professional, ethical, and legal requirements.
An organization may invite readers to comment on whether an educational article is understandable or ask intended users to review the wording of a draft resource.
Such activities may be undertaken as part of editorial development or quality improvement.
Other activities may involve structured data collection designed to answer research questions or generate knowledge beyond the particular resource being developed.
These activities can involve different requirements.
The United Kingdom's Health Research Authority distinguishes public involvement in research from participation as a research subject. People involved in research may contribute to its design, conduct, or dissemination without necessarily being study participants whose data are collected for the research.
This distinction can help clarify different roles, but it is not itself a regulatory determination under Vietnamese law.
For VLMA, the purpose and design of any proposed engagement activity should be defined before it begins.
If an activity involves human participants in biomedical or health-related research, the applicable requirements for scientific and ethical review need to be considered.
In Viet Nam, Circular No. 43/2024/TT-BYT, effective February 1, 2025, regulates the establishment, organization, and operation of ethics committees in biomedical research.
Calling an activity feedback, consultation, or quality improvement does not automatically establish that it requires formal research ethics review. Equally, those descriptions do not establish an exemption.
The appropriate determination depends on the activity's actual objectives, design, participants, risks, information collected, and applicable legal and institutional requirements.
If VLMA eventually undertakes a structured study involving patients or caregivers, the necessary scientific, ethical, institutional, and data protection arrangements would need to be determined before implementation.
The present article does not propose such a study.
Its focus is narrower: how appropriately obtained feedback about lived experience might help improve professional educational resources.
What Lived Experience Can and Cannot Establish
One of the most important responsibilities in using lived experience is being clear about the conclusions it can support.
A person may report that a recommendation was difficult to follow, that an educational resource was confusing, or that a suggested approach did not fit their daily circumstances.
These accounts are valuable information about personal experience and may help identify problems in communication or usability.
When collected and analyzed using appropriate methods, lived-experience data can also contribute to qualitative research and evidence about patient experiences, acceptability, access barriers, and other relevant questions.
However, one person's experience cannot establish the effectiveness or safety of an intervention for a wider population.
A positive account does not demonstrate that a treatment works. A negative experience does not, by itself, establish that an intervention is ineffective or inappropriate for everyone.
Scientific conclusions about treatment benefits and harms require suitable research and critical appraisal.
Patient and caregiver perspectives can help improve the relevance and usability of educational resources without replacing clinical guidance or determining treatment recommendations.
For VLMA, scientific evidence, professional expertise, and lived experience have different but potentially complementary roles.
Scientific research informs what can reasonably be concluded about an intervention's benefits, harms, and limitations.
Professional expertise helps interpret the evidence, recognize relevant clinical considerations, and communicate appropriate recommendations within authorized responsibilities.
Lived experience can reveal how information is received, what difficulties people encounter, and whether educational explanations reflect their circumstances.
Considering these perspectives together may help produce resources that are scientifically responsible and more useful in practice.
The aim is not to replace evidence with personal opinion. It is to recognize that scientific accuracy alone does not guarantee understandable or relevant communication.
How Could VLMA Know Whether Feedback Was Useful?
If feedback is used to improve an educational resource, it is reasonable to ask whether the resulting changes have made the material clearer or more useful.
A publication may become shorter or visually more attractive without necessarily becoming easier to understand.
Likewise, a reader may report satisfaction with a document without being able to explain its main message accurately.
Evaluation should therefore reflect what the feedback was intended to improve.
If the concern is clarity, the relevant question may be whether intended readers can identify the main message and explain it correctly.
If the difficulty involves terminology, feedback may help determine whether important words are familiar or require additional explanation.
If the issue concerns local relevance, people may identify examples that do not reflect their circumstances or descriptions that overlook practical barriers.
Where appropriately organized, a review of educational material might invite intended readers to explain what they understand from a short passage in their own words.
The purpose would be to identify communication difficulties, not to judge their intelligence, education, or medical knowledge.
These approaches are consistent with established health literacy principles and the importance of checking whether information can be understood by its intended audience.
Nevertheless, findings from a small group should be interpreted cautiously.
Feedback may reveal problems and guide revisions without demonstrating how well a resource will work across the broader Vietnamese population.
Improved understanding of an educational document also does not automatically establish changes in behavior, clinical practice, or health outcomes.
Those are different questions that require different evaluation methods.
For VLMA, a reasonable initial objective would be to consider whether appropriate feedback could help make selected resources clearer, more relevant, and easier to use.
As organizational capacity develops, proportionate methods for documenting concerns, recording revisions, and examining whether important communication problems were addressed may become useful.
We should not claim that such a system already exists or that revisions informed by feedback have improved clinical outcomes without supporting evidence.
Building Knowledge Resources With People in Mind
VLMA is still developing its professional foundations, and Knowledge & Evidence is an important part of that work.
Our publications are primarily intended to help healthcare professionals understand scientific evidence and consider its relevance to Vietnamese healthcare.
We also recognize that professional knowledge is often communicated onward to people receiving care.
An explanation that is accurate but difficult to understand may be challenging to use in a patient conversation. An educational example may overlook a common practical barrier. A resource may describe what should be recommended without sufficiently acknowledging the circumstances that influence whether someone can act on that recommendation.
Patient and caregiver perspectives may help identify these gaps.
Not every professional resource will require direct patient or caregiver involvement.
A technical evidence summary intended for specialists may have different educational requirements from material designed to support communication with patients.
The appropriate level of engagement should depend on the intended audience, the purpose of the resource, the questions being addressed, and the capabilities available.
We do not believe every professional publication should be rewritten for the general public.
Instead, we want to become more attentive to whether our resources are suitable for their intended readers and whether lived-experience perspectives could help improve particular aspects of their relevance or clarity.
This requires professional judgment and an understanding of VLMA's role.
It also requires recognizing that those who choose to share their experiences do not necessarily speak for everyone with a similar health condition or caregiving responsibility.
The value of listening lies partly in understanding those differences rather than expecting one perspective to represent an entire population.
Over time, constructive feedback may help VLMA recognize explanations that need improvement, examples that deserve reconsideration, or questions that require additional professional review.
These would be useful contributions, provided they are described accurately and not presented as evidence of outcomes that have not been demonstrated.
Listening to Patients and Caregivers: Our Commitment
The development of evidence-based Lifestyle Medicine in Viet Nam requires more than access to scientific publications.
It also requires communication that recognizes how people understand health information and the circumstances in which they are expected to use it.
For VLMA, patients and caregivers can offer perspectives that are relevant to this responsibility.
Their experiences may help identify unfamiliar language, examples that do not reflect everyday life, or practical difficulties that have not been adequately considered.
These contributions deserve respect, but they should not be mistaken for evidence establishing treatment effectiveness or authority to make clinical decisions.
We do not present VLMA as having established a formal patient engagement or co-design program, nor do we intend to replace healthcare institutions, patient organizations, authorized professionals, or services responsible for individual care.
Our intended role is to consider how appropriately obtained lived-experience feedback could contribute to better professional knowledge resources while maintaining scientific integrity, individual autonomy, privacy, and clear organizational boundaries.
This may begin with something relatively modest: taking a credible concern about an educational resource seriously, examining whether its explanation is clear, and considering whether an example or passage should be improved.
Other opportunities may become appropriate as our work develops. Any structured engagement would require a clear purpose, suitable safeguards, and expectations that match what VLMA can responsibly undertake.
We believe this approach is consistent with the wider purpose of our Knowledge & Evidence initiative: making scientific information not only reliable, but also relevant to the people and healthcare settings it is intended to serve.
For VLMA, listening to patients and caregivers is not about replacing scientific evidence with personal experiences. It is about recognizing that people living with health conditions, and those supporting them, may help us understand where accurate information still falls short of being useful.
Taking those perspectives seriously, while respecting professional and ethical boundaries, is one way we hope to bring scientific evidence closer to the realities of Lifestyle Medicine in Viet Nam.
Selected References
Vietnam Lifestyle Medicine Alliance. Knowledge & Evidence: How We Work With Evidence. VLMA; 2026.
World Health Organization. WHO Framework for Meaningful Engagement of People Living with Noncommunicable Diseases, and Mental Health and Neurological Conditions. WHO; May 10, 2023. ISBN: 978-92-4-007307-4.
World Health Organization. Intention to Action Series: People Power. Perspectives from Individuals with Lived Experience of Noncommunicable Diseases, Mental Health Conditions and Neurological Conditions. WHO; April 13, 2023. ISBN: 978-92-4-006972-5.
World Health Organization. Health Literacy. Fact sheet; December 22, 2025.
Brach C, editor. AHRQ Health Literacy Universal Precautions Toolkit. 3rd ed. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality; March 2024. AHRQ Publication No. 23-0075.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC Clear Communication Index. CDC. Accessed October 2026.
Health Research Authority. Public Involvement. United Kingdom. Accessed October 2026.
National Assembly of Viet Nam. Law on Medical Examination and Treatment No. 15/2023/QH15, as amended. Consolidated Text No. 26/VBHN-VPQH, February 26, 2026.
Ministry of Health of Viet Nam. Circular No. 43/2024/TT-BYT on the Establishment, Organization, and Operation of Ethics Committees in Biomedical Research. Effective February 1, 2025.
National Assembly of Viet Nam. Law on Personal Data Protection No. 91/2025/QH15. Effective January 1, 2026.
Government of Viet Nam. Decree No. 356/2025/ND-CP Detailing Certain Articles and Measures for Implementing the Law on Personal Data Protection. Effective January 1, 2026.
Editorial and Professional Scope Note
This article presents the organizational perspective and intended direction of the Vietnam Lifestyle Medicine Alliance as of October 2026. It is intended for professional information, education, and knowledge exchange. It does not constitute a clinical practice guideline, individualized medical advice, a formal patient engagement policy, a research protocol, or an official regulatory interpretation.
Examples of patient and caregiver feedback, educational resource review, consultation, and potential participation are illustrative unless explicitly identified as established VLMA activities. The article does not imply that VLMA has established a patient advisory group, implemented a formal co-design program, conducted a representative assessment of patient or caregiver experiences, or demonstrated improvements in clinical outcomes through such activities.
VLMA is a physician-led professional platform operated by Vietnam Lifestyle Medicine Alliance Company Limited. It is not a healthcare service provider or medical licensing authority. Lived-experience feedback does not replace scientific evidence, authorized clinical judgment, or applicable professional responsibilities. Any future activities involving personal information, patient experiences, identifiable narratives, research, or institutional collaboration must comply with applicable Vietnamese legal, ethical, confidentiality, institutional, and personal data protection requirements.
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A physician-led professional platform advancing Lifestyle Medicine through education, collaboration, research, and responsible implementation.
VLMA is operated by Vietnam Lifestyle Medicine Alliance Company Limited, Enterprise Registration Number 0318902666.
VLMA is a Sister Organization of the Lifestyle Medicine Global Alliance and a Member Organization of the Planetary Health Alliance.
VLMA is not a medical service provider and does not issue medical licenses or IBLM certification.
