Distance education and diabetes empowerment: A single-blind randomized control trial

Aims: Diabetes is one of the biggest problems in healthcare systems and kills many people every year.
Diabetes management is impossible when only utilizing medication. So, patients must be educated to
manage their diabetes. This study aims to assess the effect of education by telephone and short message
service on empowering patients with type 2 diabetes (primary outcome).
Materials and methods: A single-blind randomized controlled trial was conducted in the Urmia diabetes
association in Iran. Sixty six participants with definitive diagnosis of type 2 diabetes entered into the
study. Patients with secondary health problems were excluded. Patients were selected by simple random
sampling then allocated into intervention (n = 33) and control (n = 33) groups. The intervention group
received an educational text message daily and instructive phone calls three days a week for three
months along with usual care. The Diabetes Empowerment Scale (DES) with confirmed validity and
reliability was used for collecting data. Data was analyzed using SPSS V6.1. Independent t-test, paired ttest
and chi-square were used to analyze the data.
Results: The empowerment of the intervention group compared with the control group significantly
improved after three months of distance education (p < 0.00, EF = 1. 16).
Conclusions: The study
findings show that the distance education has a significant effect on empowering
patients with type 2 diabetes. Therefore, using distance education along with other diabetes
management intervention is highly effective and should be part of the care in diabetes treatment