ENTRED 2007: Results of a French national survey on self-management education to people with diabetes... still a long way to go!

Abstract

Introduction: Over the past decade, self-management education has emerged as an important priority in France. Under the term therapeutic patient education, it has become compulsory for health care settings willing to implement self-management education programmes to be authorized according to national quality criteria and accreditation standards. Objectives: Our article summarizes data from a French national survey-ENTRED 2007-which aimed to assess to what extent self-management education was perceived by diabetic patients and their physicians to be part of the routine care to diabetic patients in France. Methods: Our study included a representative sample of 4,120 diabetic patients (of which 3,847 patients with type 2 diabetes and 273 patients with type 1 diabetes), as well as 2,392 physicians (of which 80% in primary care and 20% in specialised care). Results/Discussion: Our results show that despite incentives in relation to the preparation of the legal framework, there was still a lack of systematic implementation of self-management education as part of the routine medical care provided to patients with diabetes in 2007 in France. Moreover, we have evidenced discrepancies between patients' and physicians' perceptions regarding impact of diabetes on the patients' quality of life, performance of self-management tasks by patients, and patients' participation in decision-making processes. Such discrepancies call for sustained efforts to motivate and train healthcare providers to implement patient-centred self-management support interventions. © 2014 EDP Sciences, SETE.