Diabetes Self-Management Adherence to Physical Exercise and Nutrition Literature Review Chapter

Diabetes

A recent study conducted by Okolie et al. determined that diabetes is a current concern to the healthcare industry and that it not only would be a continuing concern for decades to come, but it would also grow in magnitude, especially among the non-developed nations as compared to the developed nations of the world where it is already a more prevalent problem. The researchers wrote that diabetes was of a very high concern and that "such a chronic condition requires self-care, which can be developed from a thorough understanding of the disease process and the management challenges by the patient and family members" (Okolie, Uchenna, Ehiemere, Ijeoma, Iheanccho, 2009, p. 354). What their study was seeking to determine was whether those patient and family challenges could be overcome by implementing an educational program that would emphasize diet and exercise.

The study's environment involved diabetic patients from Nigeria who were provided with weekly care at a government clinic. The study administered surveys to determine specifically what the diabetics were being taught regarding their disease and the short- and long-term effects of self-management. The study's specific objectives included; 1) determining the level of patient's knowledge concerning diabetes mellitus, 2) determining the patient's knowledge of the management and control measures that are effective with diabetes mellitus, 3) determining the patient's knowledge of how to self-care for diabetes mellitus and. 4) to identify the level and quality of health information received by the patients from the health care providers.

The study was successful in determining that the levels in that particular area of the globe and at that specific clinic, were quite low.

The study found that 75% of the subjects did not know that major causes of diabetes and that 88.5% did not know how to avoid its complications while 74.% did not know how to prevent or control diabetes at all.

Other findings of the study were that the overall education level regarding nutrition, exercise and self-care were all extremely low as well. These findings are troublesome because the lack of knowledge and the absence of adherence to self-care techniques likely leads to additional problems for the diabetics, problems that could have been avoided.

The resulting poor health that comes from lack of adherence to an overall health plan for diabetics has been well documented. Wei et al. wrote in a 2000 study that physical inactivity and poor physical fitness have both been well established as increasing mortality in people with diabetes (Wei, Kampert, Blair, 2000). Additionally, a study conducted on mice to determine the positive or negative effects of exercise from a diabetic standpoint discovered that the "data provides strong evidence for a protective effect of long-term training exercise program against chemically-induced diabetes in mice? (Cimbiz, Ozay, Yuredeler, Cayci, Colak, Askoy, 2011, p. 69). Cimbiz et al. also determined that exercise can and should be used in the prevention and treatment of diabetes. An additional…