The world-wide rise in chronic disease demands a shift from traditional provide-centered care toward collaborative care, in which facilitating patients' self-management is a key component. Self-management is a person's ability to manage a chronic condition (symptoms, treatment, physical and psychosocial consequences, and life style changes) in such a way that optimal quality of life is achieved. Healthcare providers should be fully equipped to provide adequate self-management support (SMS). Nurses, with their central role in patient care, are expected to take the lead in this direction, implying that new competencies need to developed and trained.
NURSE-CC (Nursing Research into Self-management and Empowerment in Chronic Care) is an ambitious, joint effort of researchers and nurses of Rotterdam University, Erasmus University and Erasmus MC together.

In dual approach, this program aims to (1) enhance (the effectiveness of) self-management support provided by nurses to people with CC; (2) improve nurses' competencies and nursing education in this regard.