{"id":448,"date":"2011-06-06T23:48:41","date_gmt":"2011-06-06T23:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/touchendocrinology.com\/2011\/06\/06\/the-role-of-group-care-in-the-management-of-type-2-diabetes\/"},"modified":"2011-06-06T23:48:41","modified_gmt":"2011-06-06T23:48:41","slug":"the-role-of-group-care-in-the-management-of-type-2-diabetes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/touchendocrinology.com\/diabetes\/journal-articles\/the-role-of-group-care-in-the-management-of-type-2-diabetes\/","title":{"rendered":"The Role of Group Care in the Management of Type 2 Diabetes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Increasing evidence supports the pivotal role of health education in preventing and treating diabetes more effectively.1,2<\/sup> The World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe officially acknowledged in its 1980 and 1992 reports that education should allow patients to acquire and maintain the ability and skills necessary to live a fulfilling life with their disease, and the results of the UK Prospective Diabetes Study3<\/sup> and Diabetes Control and Complications Trial4<\/sup> further support its importance.
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\nIncreasing evidence supports the pivotal role of health education in preventing and treating diabetes more effectively.1,2<\/sup> The World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe officially acknowledged in its 1980 and 1992 reports that education should allow patients to acquire and maintain the ability and skills necessary to live a fulfilling life with their disease, and the results of the UK Prospective Diabetes Study3<\/sup> and Diabetes Control and Complications Trial4<\/sup> further support its importance. Education must take into account the process of coping with the disease, the \u2018locus\u2019 from which diabetes is controlled and the objective and subjective needs of patients, be they stated or unexpressed. J Dewey said that education has to \u201cfoster the liberty of the human personality\u201d, and health education should reach that goal too. <\/p>\n

In 2005 the UK Department of Health and Diabetes developed a set of criteria for structured patient education in type 2 diabetes.5<\/sup> Some recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses on the effectiveness of self-management education in type 2 diabetes6\u20139<\/sup> have shown, among other points, that one critical issue is sustaining the educational input, as patients may improve their glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c) over the first three months following the end of education but then slip back to previous levels unless the educational programme is sustained. Consequently, structured education should be offered to patients at the onset of diabetes and then continued for the rest of their life. A good example of the former is provided by the Diabetes Education for Ongoing and Newly Diagnosed (DESMOND) programme10,11<\/sup> recently completed in the UK in people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes, who were offered special education sessions aimed at improving diabetes self-management skills and encouraging appropriate lifestyles. With Group Care, we aimed at developing a model that would make education the core of continuing diabetes care<\/p>\n

The Group Care Model<\/h4>\n

Observation Stage \u2013 The Waiting Room<\/h5>\n

In January 1996 we started a randomised controlled clinical trial to test a new concept of educational and clinical care for patients with type 2 diabetes. We called it \u2018Group Care\u2019 to stress that:<\/p>\n