Influence of education training in patients with type 2 diabetes in the improvement of lifestyle and biochemical characteristics: a randomized controlled trial
Article Category: Original article
Published Online: Dec 31, 2019
Page range: 293 - 299
Received: May 20, 2019
Accepted: Aug 31, 2019
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/FON-2019-0046
Keywords
© 2019 Ramaj and Kamberi, published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License.
Objective
The objective of this randomized controlled trial study was to evaluate the education training in relation to lifestyle improvement in patients with type 2 diabetes through its influence in the levels of glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), blood pressure, triglyceride, cholesterol levels, and body mass index (BMI).
Methods
The study included patients with type 2 diabetes randomly selected from 20 residential areas in Tirana, Albania where family physicians provide services. The sample size in total was 200 patients in both groups (control and intervention). The education training (four sessions) was conducted by trained nursing staff for 6 months. Patients were screened for the biochemical profile before and after the intervention. To compare the groups with respect to the interest outcomes, the
Results
There were 104 male patients and 96 female patients. The mean age was 54.9 ± 8.7. No significant differences were found between the study groups in relation to clinical and biochemical data before the education sessions. After the intervention, in the intervention group, the mean level of HbA1c was significantly lower than the value in the control group (6.2% vs 6.8%,
Conclusions
The results of this study further support that the approach for education of patients with type 2 diabetes on changing lifestyle benefit the patient in controlling diabetes. It is believed that the establishment of diabetes education classes in health centers is an important investment in improving the management of type 2 diabetes.