Diabetes Management Program Education Materials
The Diabetes Management Program at Brigham and Womens Hospital has a strong educational component and is certified by the American Diabetes Association as an Education Recognition Program. We offer individual and group training sessions at many of the BWH Diabetes Management Program locations.
What is diabetes? What is insulin? How does diabetes affect the body? Marie McDonnell, M.D., Chief of the Diabetes Section of the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Hypertension at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, answers patients’ most commonly searched questions about diabetes.
In addition, the materials below are provided for patients, family members and caregivers of patients with diabetes, from the newly diagnosed patient to those in the long term diabetes management phases. The series, from Mass General Brigham, includes:
How Can I Find Dsmes Services
Your doctor may give you a referral to a specific program and a number to call. If your doctor doesnt refer you to specific services, go to the Find a Diabetes Education Program in Your Areaexternal icon website. This website lists DSMES services recognized by the American Diabetes Association or accredited by the American Association of Diabetes Educators.
How Do I Get Enrolled Onto Structured Diabetes Education
NICE recommends that every newly diagnosed diabetes patient should be given the opportunity to get diabetes training, and most patients agree that they need help to manage their condition.
Despite the NICE recommendations, data from charity Diabetes UK shows that only a small number of newly diagnosed patients are provided with a place on a diabetes education course.
A report into the number of people receiving diabetes education in 2011/12 showed that only 1 in 30 people newly diagnosed with diabetes were recorded as having attended a diabetes education course.
If you are interested in taking part in structured diabetes training, speak to your GP, diabetes specialist nurse or diabetes consultant. You may need to wait for an available slot but the NICE guidelines state that you should be offered the chance to go onto a course if you have not done so already.
If you have previously attended a structured education course a number of years ago but feel you would benefit from refreshing your knowledge, most GPs should be happy to help you enroll onto a course.
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You Have Just Been Diagnosed With Diabetes What Does That Mean
There are different types of diabetes. Here is a short explanation of the different types. Ask your doctor which type of diabetes you have.Pre-diabetes:People with pre-diabetes are at increased risk for: developing type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Positive lifestyle changes in the areas of exercise and healthy eating can reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes.Type 2 diabetes:People with type 2 diabetes either do not produce enough insulin or their body does not use the insulin properly. Insulin can get lazy over time. This can lead to higher than normal blood sugar levels.Type 1 diabetes:People with type 1 diabetes do not produce any insulin. They must take insulin injections to survive.
Being diagnosed with diabetes can make you feel scared, angry or overwhelmed. These are all normal responses to a new diagnosis. Sometimes its helpful to talk to family, friends or your diabetes team for support and guidance.
How Will Dsmes Help Me
When you learn that you have diabetes, your first question might be, What can I eat? DSMES will answer this question and many others. Your first step should be ask your doctor to refer you for DSMES. If your doctor does not talk to you about these services, bring it up during your visit.
DSMES services include a health care team who will teach you how to stay healthy and how to make what you learn a regular part of your life.
DSMES services will help you:
- Make better decisions about your diabetes.
- Work with your health care team to get the support you need.
- Understand how to take care of yourself and learn the skills to:
- Eat healthy.
- Check your blood sugar .
- Take your medicine.
- Cope with the emotional side of diabetes.
- Reduce your risk of other health problems.
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What Is Important For People With Diabetes
You can follow your diabetes meal plan by adding fruits and vegetables, beans, whole grains, chicken and turkey with skin, fish and lean meats without fats or low-fat versions of dairy products. Sugar-sweetened beverages should not be consumed. You can minimize calories, saturated fat, trans fat, sugar, and salt by making low-calorie foods.
Assessing And Encouraging Compliance
Barriers to compliance should be identified, and the patient’s active participation should be used to address these barriers using specific treatments. The goals should be clear and behavior-oriented, and a follow-up schedule should be made. There is a considerable amount of information and activity required of diabetic patients to effectively self-manage the disease. The lifelong need to self-manage diabetes compounds this challenge, and patients may develop a syndrome called diabetic distress . Diabetic distress “refers to significant negative psychological reactions related to emotional burdens and worries specific to an individual’s experience in having to manage a severe, complicated, and demanding chronic disease such as diabetes . Diabetic distress is a common problem, and it can harm many aspects of self-management, e.g., adherence to the medication regimen, higher A1C levels, and poor diet and exercise habits . All healthcare professionals that care for diabetic patients should be aware of this syndrome, and periodic evaluation for its presence is recommended .
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The Role Of The Nursing Team In Diabetes Care
Diabetes Specialist Nurses are crucial in providing good patient care and promoting self-care management. DSNs work wholly in diabetes care and may be employed in a variety of care settings. A DSN is often the first point of contact for people, referring them to other specialist services. A joint position statement on how DSNs can improve patient outcomes and deliver cost effective care, produced by Diabetes UK, the RCN and Training, Research and Education for Nurses on Diabetes is available here. Competencies relating to diabetes nursing, dietetics and podiatry can be found here. DSNs will also provide training, education and support to non-specialist health care professionals including GP’s, nurses in primary, secondary and community settings and care homes.
All nursing staff have an important role and clear responsibilities when treating people with diabetes. Nursing teams from across the nursing spectrum including occupational health nurses, nurses working in public health and school nurses are likely to come into contact with people who have diabetes or are having tests to diagnose diabetes. Practice nurses have a particularly vital role as they are often the people who carry out the annual diabetes and foot check. Practice nurses in particular play a clinical role in screening, maintaining and supporting people with diabetes.
Why Is It Important For The Nurse To Educate The Patient
Patient education: what is m Education Important? ? Nurses must educate patients as much as possible when working in healthcare settings. Having access to education can help patients in improving their physical and mental health. Enhancing communication between patients and their caregivers increases their chance of participating in a healthier environment.
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Level Three Education: What Is The Evidence Base
Diabetes education courses, often known as structured education, improve key outcomes, reduce the onset of complications and are cost effective or even cost saving.
For a summary of the published evidence on structured education download our report Diabetes Education: the big missed opportunity in diabetes care .
What Diabetes Education Should You Provide To A Patient Who Is A Diabetic
Providing nutrition education, such as meal planning, weight loss strategies, and other education regarding diet changes, can enhance health and well-being. Self-management strategies and skills are developed through problem solving. Knowing how to interpret and react to a diabetic blood glucose reading will help you make better decisions.
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How Can Nurses Educate Patients About Diabetes
In accordance with the nursing profession, there are roles and responsibilities pertaining to diabetes care: prevention advice, coaching behavior change and working with people with behavioral problems Screening, prevention, and early detection of type 2 diabetes, diabetes that typically affects the elderly . Aiming to promote self-care.
The Pathological Process Of Diabetes
Patients do not need in-depth knowledge of the pathological process of diabetes, but they should have the information that is essential for successful self-management of the disease. The following points should be covered the provided level of detail will be situationally dependent.
What is diabetes: Diabetes is a chronic disease that affects the body’s ability to control blood sugar levels. If it is not properly treated, diabetes causes high blood sugar levels, and chronic high blood sugar – hyperglycemia – can cause serious complications.
The causes of diabetes: Type 1 diabetes is caused by the destruction of the pancreatic cells that produce insulin. Type 2 diabetes is caused by insufficient insulin production and an inability to use the available insulin. Type 1 diabetes is essentially genetic and inherited. Type 2 diabetes is caused by susceptibility to the disease and lifestyle factors.
What is insulin: Insulin is a naturally produced hormone that is used to carry glucose from the blood to the cells and tissues. Without insulin, glucose cannot be used by the body, accumulating in the blood.
Glucose: Glucose, commonly called blood sugar, is one of the primary sources of energy for the body.
A cure for diabetes: Type 1 diabetes cannot be cured, and someone who has this disease must be on life-long insulin therapy. Type 2 diabetes can be controlled but not cured, and someone who has type 2 diabetes must be on a life-long program of diabetes self-management.
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Refining The Practice Of Dsme
In recent years, both the ADA and the AADE have scrutinized the literature,promulgated better research, and modified their recommendations regarding the components of general diabetes education. There has been an important shift from helping patients acquire knowledge for its own sake to providing them with the knowledge, skills, and beliefs needed to achieve self-care behaviors that are thought to result in positive outcomes, both clinical and psychosocial. As a result, educational goals are becoming more specific and are expanding to include more counseling activities that facilitate implementation of, or at least informed choices about, self-care recommendations.
Prediabetes and the metabolic syndrome may manifest with stress during a hospitalization. This situation presents an additional opportunity to intervene with nutrition, physical activity, and preventive self-care education and behavior-change counseling. But this opportunity may tax an already weak system for delivery of quality inpatient education.
What Is Diabetes Self
People learn about their condition in different ways. A useful framework for understanding diabetes education, broadly based on a model used in Scotland, is in three levels:
- Level three: Structured education that meets nationally-agreed criteria , including an evidence-based curriculum, quality assurance of teaching standards and regular audit.
- Level two: Ongoing learning that may be quite informal, perhaps through a peer group.
- Level one: Information and one-to-one advice.
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What Can Diabetics Do To Educate Patients
Learn how to live well by improving your diet. It may include meal planning, weight loss strategies, or other methods of nutrition research specific to your disease. Learn how to manage diabetes through problem-solving strategies. Learn how to interpret and correctly react to results of blood glucose tests.
Patient Education In The Hospital
Anne T. Nettles Patient Education in the Hospital. Diabetes Spectr 1 January 2005 18 : 4448.
In Brief Recent concern about the optimum management of hyperglycemia for hospital patients has heightened awareness of necessary standards of care. Publications have confirmed that diabetes is not diagnosed or treated when detected in acute care settings, and opportunities for education are missed. Hospitalization presents an opportunity to address patients’ unique urgent learning needs. In centers where quality diabetes management is a priority, education is readily available, roles are clear, and quality is monitored, evidence supports the notion that inpatient education is related to earlier discharge and improved outcomes following discharge.
Much of the literature on inpatient diabetes education then focused on the knowledge deficiencies of hospital staff and what to teach newly diagnosed patients. Continuing education for nurses in the hospital was important. Nurses agreed,and some believed patients were more knowledgeable than they were themselves.
Interested diabetes nurses began their diabetes specialization in the hospital. Clinical nurse specialists served the diabetic populations in larger teaching hospitals, providing quality improvement, staff education, and direct patient consultation. Soon efforts were made to develop national educational standards.
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Treatment For Type 1 Diabetes
Insulin given by injection is the central treatment for type 1 diabetes. There are fast acting and long acting insulin formulations. It is important to understand when to use these different formulations and the concepts behind choosing the right insulin dose. There is one other injected medication for type 1 diabetes, Symlin, that may be given in addition to insulin.
How Should The Nurse Educate The Diabetic Patient On Foot Care
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Diabetic Patient Education: Basic Principles
Diabetes and its attendant complications are devastating diseases. However, there is strong evidence that with glycemic control, lifestyle modifications, the proper use of medications, and control of risk factors like hyperlipidemia and hypertension, prediabetes, type 2 diabetes, and diabetic complications can be prevented, delayed, or their progression slowed10 There is also evidence that by using preventive interventions, remission of type 2 diabetes can be attained .
Diabetes is a chronic disease, and although some patients who have type 2 diabetes can achieve remission, diabetes is essentially incurable, and lifelong self-management is necessary. As was mentioned above, preventive interventions can help patients control diabetes. However, many patients who have diabetes cannot or do not lose weight or stop smoking, and they do not have adequate control of their blood pressure, lipid levels, or blood sugar . Approximately one-third of US adult diabetics do not have the desired A1c levels, and the number who have good glycemic control and have the optimal serum cholesterol level and blood pressure are far less. Despite the many advances in diabetic care, therapeutic goals are not being met .
But I Dont Feel Sick And My Weight Is Totally Fine Skinny Is Good Right
Skinny does not always equal healthy. While the association between having a high BMI and diabetes or prediabetes is well-established, weight alone is not the only thing that can put you at risk. Big skinny-fat risk factors for diabetes? Neglecting exercise, regulating weight through food choices alone, yo-yo dieting and chronic stress.
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Level Two Education: Informal And Ongoing Learning
In 2015 Diabetes UK commissioned the King’s Fund to review the evidence on informal and flexible approaches to self-management education. The report concludes that people with diabetes are best served by having a menu of education options to choose from and recommends further research into level two initiatives.
Diabetes Classification And Pathophysiology
There are many types of diabetes, and they can be usefully classified into four groups. The condition of prediabetes will also be discussed.
Type 1 diabetes: Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease caused by genetic susceptibility and environmental triggers . It is characterized by pancreatic cell destruction and lack of insulin production . The onset typically occurs during childhood or adolescence, and type 1 diabetes accounts for ~ 5-10% of all disease cases in the United States . In a very small percentage of cases of type 1 diabetes, the patients do not secrete insulin, but there is no evidence of autoimmunity these patients have what is called idiopathic type 1 diabetes .
Type 2 diabetes: Type 2 diabetes is characterized by insulin resistance and a relative lack of insulin production . Type 2 diabetes is also caused by an interplay of genetics and environment, but in this form of the disease, the environmental factors that increase the risk of developing type 2 diabetes have been identified, and many of them are modifiable, e.g., diet, obesity, and a sedentary lifestyle .
Gestational diabetes: Gestational diabetes is defined as insulin resistance and abnormal glucose tolerance that occurs during pregnancy . Approximately 9% of all pregnancies are complicated by gestational diabetes7 Many women who have gestational diabetes will develop the disorder in subsequent pregnancies, and approximately 50% will eventually develop type 2 diabetes .
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How To Take Care Of A Diabetic Patient
This article was medically reviewed by Luba Lee, FNP-BC, MS. Luba Lee, FNP-BC is a board certified Family Nurse Practitioner and educator in Tennessee with over a decade of clinical experience. Luba has certifications in Pediatric Advanced Life Support , Emergency Medicine, Advanced Cardiac Life Support , Team Building, and Critical Care Nursing. She received her Master of Science in Nursing from the University of Tennessee in 2006.wikiHow marks an article as reader-approved once it receives enough positive feedback. In this case, 94% of readers who voted found the article helpful, earning it our reader-approved status. This article has been viewed 27,031 times.
Diabetes is a condition that occurs when the pancreas either makes not enough insulin or not enough insulin at all. This makes it difficult for the body to regulate the person’s blood sugar. If you are caring for someone with diabetes you can help them by offering support, making lifestyle changes together, and helping them manage their medications.