About

Perceptio Cibus is a Swiss non-profit association that supports people living with obesity or overweight. It mainly promotes listening to its own internal regulatory systems, expressing itself through hunger, satiety and satiation. It further encourages the valuation of the diversity of food cultures and the acceptance of emotional eating, through the promotion of reconciliation with one’s body and eating habits.

To do this, Perceptio Cibus provides an infrastructure based on discussion groups, workshops on available support, centered on the person of C. Roger and the Focusing technique of E. Gendlin, as well as Jacobson’s progressive muscle relaxation sessions and adapted physical activities.

Perceptio Cibus is also active within a network of practitioners specializing in these themes and participates in researches, clinical studies and various related activities at Swiss and European level.

Who is the patient partner?

Respect to healthcare professionals, the patient partner can be seen as a patient, expert patient, citizen patient and peer practitioner.
The same person can embody these different roles at different times in their developping process.

• The patient is a person whose physical and / or mental health requires the intervention of health professionals in order to regain his health.
• The expert patient
  shares his knowledge on the disease and the treatments. This expertise acquired by living with the disease as well as hospital experience allows patients to develop an authentic partnership with professionals, to discuss or even to question certain practices (Grimaldi, A. (2010). ‘”The Lay Expert”.

The forums of health, 2 (27), 91-100), are indeed very well placed to assess the quality of services and identify areas for improvement suited to their needs. This experience-sharing can be done with other expert patients and in all areas of activity such as healthcare, governance, hospitality or communication.

• The patient “citizen” is involved in health policies and even in the development and revision of public health laws. It demonstrates civic engagement and is mobilized around topics related to health.
• The peer practitioner is a person who has already experienced the disease and its treatments and who shares his experience with a “novice” patient in order to support him. At this stage, the patient who became a peer practitioner is able to take a step back and conceptualize from his experience. Peer practitioners benefit from certified training (School of Social and Pedagogical Studies Lausanne Haute École de travail social et de la santé Vaud Certificate of peer practitioners in mental health), on the key elements of aiding relationship (active listening , ethical principles of support, etc.) supervised by qualified professionals.

The Perceptio Cibus association and its members are part of this process!

The role of our patient association is also to break the isolation caused by the disease and to promote awareness or recognition of conditions that are often poorly understood. Patient associations have gradually become a partner for doctors and health institutions.