Evaluation of a Health Education Program for Type 2 Diabetes Patients

Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is the most frequent complication of Diabetes mellitus and the main cause of legal blindness in working populations in industrialized countries.

A diagnosis of diabetes has important implications for individuals, not only for their health, but also because of the stigma that a diagnosis can bring, i.e., it can affect employment, quality of life, mental health, social opportunities, and other cultural aspects. These changes in the lives of diabetics can lead to stress. It is known that diabetes has a social and family connotation that leads to depression and anxiety appearing in parallel, which can influence the self-management that people must do in their daily lives. It is necessary to incorporate and integrate mental health care into all diabetic care.

Individuals with diabetes have difficulties: diagnosis, adherence to treatment, fear of complications and hypoglycemia, which can result in suffering, thus making self-management difficult.

In diabetic patients, the prevalence of symptoms of depression and anxiety is about two to four times higher than in the general population. Metabolic dysregulation influences brain function and disturbances in glucose regulation may be associated with depression. These emotions that arise can be disabling and very strong, leading the individual to often acquire behaviors that do not help in fighting the disease. There may be changes in eating behavior, or alcoholic beverages that are not favorable to glycemic control, that is, glycaemia rises proportionally to the most negative events in life, thus, stress leads to an increase in corticosteroids and consequently increases glycaemia. It is known that physical activity can reduce disease rates, namely diabetes, hypertension, obesity, among others. There are studies that show that physical activity is beneficial, whatever its intensity. It reduces the admission of chronically ill patients to hospitals, reduces pain and increases mental health and quality of life. With the development of physical activity programs applied to chronically ill patients, they are beneficial to promote the management of their disease, physical and mental health, and reduce the appearance of other comorbidities. In Diabetes Mellitus, the causes are complex, and its complications can be prevented with a healthy diet, normal blood glucose, adequate weight, and physical activity. For health professionals, who deal with these chronically ill patients, they have a huge challenge, since these people present risk behaviors (unhealthy eating and/or sedentary lifestyle). To assess the disease, there is glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c), which reflects the average blood glucose. It is used as a risk parameter and considered the gold standard for assessing glycemic control. The American Diabetes Association (ADA) sets HbA1c < 7% as the threshold of good control for most people with diabetes. To improve glycemic control, nutritional monitoring is important. Nutrition education is considered a preventive and treatment strategy to provide diabetic people with the necessary tools to face the change in lifestyle and achieve self-management of the disease. For this, it is necessary to increase knowledge, acquisition of skills, as well as promote the modification of attitudes and behaviors. It is important to increase people's active participation in the control and treatment of their disease.

Diabetics should participate in self-care education actions with the body, to improve the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary for the self-care of this pathology.