This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Technology brings diabetes education to patients’ doorsteps
AADE Annual Meeting and Exhibition
LAS VEGAS — Health care providers struggling to improve patient access to their services may benefit from diabetes education programs rooted in Internet technology, a speaker said here.
A major issue related to management of type 2 diabetes is the inability of widespread clinics and primary care practices to provide lifestyle interventions to patients at high risk for diabetes, according to Margaret R. Rukstalis, MD, of Geisinger Health Systems in Danville, Pa. Rukstalis and colleagues explored methods to overcome this barrier by using the Technologies in Diabetes Education (TIDE) program.
“As we are forced to do more with less money, technologies can help us implement and deliver interventions to patients on their own schedules,” Rukstalis said during a presentation. “We designed a program that partners with primary care programs to save time. It focuses on how to engage patients with type 2 diabetes by employing state-of-the-art technologies that include educational and motivational science.”
Through shared medical visits with nurses or diabetes educators, patients established their own goals, such as reducing portion sizes or decreasing HbA1c by a certain percentage, and then tailored their personal TIDE program website to suit their needs. The site offered quizzes and different web-based applications. Many aspects were also interactive, Rukstalis said. A weekly email regarding diet, for example, might provide links to cooking videos or articles about specific recipes. Patients could also pose questions and receive answers within 24 hours via messaging.
For their study, Rukstalis and colleagues randomly assigned 116 people to the TIDE intervention and 49 people to a control group that received Geisinger Diabetes System of Care diabetes education. In the intervention arm, 76% of participants engaged in the TIDE program, with more than half demonstrating moderate to high involvement.
Most importantly, Rukstalis said, the intervention group engaged in learning more about their diabetes. They were able to answer more questions on a diabetes knowledge questionnaire when compared with control participants. Further, results from the Partners in Health survey indicated that those who participated in the TIDE program made significant improvements in attitudes and behaviors toward self-care in nine of 11 categories.Of those with a decrease in HbA1c, intervention participants experienced greater decreases in HbA1c than those in the control arm.
Participants viewed TIDE as a positive intervention, Rukstalis said. They appreciated the increased support offered by the 24-hour access to the program, which, in contrast, is only episodically available during visits with diabetes educators.
“Prescribing diabetes education doesn’t necessarily lead to patients' going. It requires scheduling [and] traveling to clinics that may not even exist in rural areas,” Rukstalis said. “This intervention … allows you to bring high-quality, engaging material into patients’ homes all the time on their own schedule.” – by Melissa Foster
For more information:
- Rukstalis MR. T10c. Presented at: the American Association of Diabetes Educators Annual Meeting & Exhibition; Aug. 3-6, 2011; Las Vegas.
Disclosure: Dr. Rukstalis reports no relevant financial disclosures.
As a member of the AADE research committee … we are trying to get diabetes educators more interested in research, in doing their own research and implementing research into evidence-based practice. This presentation discussed research about helping patients with diabetes who have decreased access to health care for one reason or another. I personally am located in the Houston-Galveston area in Texas, where there is an urban population. There, we also encounter problems with decreased access because many people are poor or have limited transportation. Therefore, anything we can do to increase access is important. The TIDE program is an interesting joint venture between two different industries that are trying to better patient care, and even though the researcher is a physician the intervention does not have a practice-driven focus. Their data are exciting because they are seeing good results in terms of weight loss and decreasing HbA1c.
– Charlotte A. Wisnewski, PhD, RN, CDE
Associate Professor of Nursing
University of Texas Medical Branch
Disclosure: Dr. Wisnewski reports no relevant financial disclosures.
 |
Follow EndocrineToday.com on Twitter. |