A structured therapeutic education program for patients with type 1 diabetes

Abstract

Type 1 diabetes is a chronic disease that represents a global health problem that its incidence is constantly increasing, hence the need for an effective management approach to control the disease and its complications. The main objective of this work is to share the experience of our service in the therapeutic education of the type 1 diabetic patient, from a study spread over 16 months involving 142 patients, including a 1st phase during the collection of data was made during patient hospitalization for therapeutic education, and a 2nd phase during which an evaluation was made after 6 months of intervention. The average age of our patients was 17 years. Among our recruited patients, 54% were able to benefit from the educational program for the initiation of functional insulin therapy. The evaluation after the educational intervention at 6 months was carried out in 78, 8% of our patients, having objectified a significant glycemic evolution by a 1.7% drop in HbA1c and an increase in the percentage of adherence to lifestyle and dietary measures and the practice of regular self-monitoring of the glycaemia as well as an improvement in the mean of the overall treatment satisfaction score was noted after the educational intervention. Our results underline the importance of therapeutic education in the management of diabetic patients, the main objective of which is to improve their quality of life, which was highlighted by the patient testimonial sessions and their entourage, which remain a novelty of the educational program called "Type One.. Number One" ,whose objective is to serve to motivation for type 1 diabetics, their entourage and also the medical team.