Salutogenic Approach in Chronic Disease Management Across the Lifespan; Narrative Review

Purpose: To synthesize how Antonovsky’s salutogenic model—pecifically the sense of coherence and generalized resistance resources—guides chronic disease management across the lifespan, and to outline implications for nursing, services, and policy. Methods: Narrative review of theoretical and empirical studies spanning children and adolescents, working-age adults, and older adults. We examined interventions that strengthen comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness while mobilizing personal and social resources in clinical and service contexts. Results: Viewing health as a continuum and building resources is linked to better coping, self-management, and well-being in chronic illness. In children and adolescents, empowering education and peer support foster developmentally appropriate coping and meaning. In adults, self-management and psychoeducational programs that build knowledge, skills, and social connectedness improve patient-reported outcomes. In older adults, structured resource programs increase healthpromoting behaviors and may improve quality of life in the short term. Across settings, a lifespan salutogenic lens shifts care toward health creation and equity by emphasizing patient strengths and contexts. Conclusion: Salutogenic strategies show short-term benefits and offer a practical framework for person-centered nursing. Training health professionals, redesigning services as health-promoting settings, and embedding salutogenesis in policy can advance equitable, strengths-based chronic care across the lifespan.