Learning how to manage the emotional impact of living with diabetes may help increase diabetes distress, a new study shows.
The burden and anxiety associated with living with diabetes is called diabetes distress, and approximately three-quarters of people with type 1 diabetes experience diabetes distress.
Importantly, diabetes distress can lead to poorly managed symptoms, including forgetting to take medications, elevated blood sugar levels, and frequent episodes of hypoglycemia (hypoglycemia). Quality of life may deteriorate.
This means it's important for people living with diabetes distress to find ways to overcome these feelings, and one of the experts involved in this latest study says: . ”
This study included three group programs. One focused on educating participants about diabetes and managing the condition. The second study looked at the psychological effects of diabetes. The third one combines the two approaches.
All three methods helped participants reduce diabetes distress and lower blood sugar levels, but an emotion-focused program called TunedIn compared to the other methods studied. It was the best at alleviating the pain of diabetes. This program also produced the most consistent benefits.
Lead author Daniel Hessler-Jones said: “Most people with diabetes have never heard of diabetes distress, never been asked about it, and don't understand that it can be alleviated. If virtual group-based programs prove effective, , we have a chance to change that.”
TunedIn uses elements of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). This helps raise awareness of how distressing emotions and thoughts can lead to behaviors that are counterproductive to diabetes management. This strategy has also been successful in managing other chronic diseases.
Professor Jones explained: “By providing patients with type 1 diabetes with the opportunity to recognize and observe these processes and to ‘stand alongside them,’ they can make different choices that have the potential to positively impact their health and well-being. You may be able to make a choice.”
Research shows that half of people who used TunedIn for one year no longer felt diabetic distress, compared to 27% of those who used the educational program and 31% of those who combined the two programs. I didn't experience it.
“If we don't address the emotional part of living with the disease, it won't work,” said co-author and endocrinology professor Umesh Masharani. It is important to receive
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