Translating Research on Diabetes Education into Practice
Jun 7, 2011, 01:00 AM
Did you know that there are several papers published in The Diabetes Educator journal (available through the AADE website) that can help you translate research into your practice?
I, for one, am a big fan of systematic reviews. A person, or a group of people, examined each of the AADE7 Self-Care Behaviors® and did a literature search, read through and evaluated the quality of each paper, and synthesized the information for us! Can you imagine how long that would take if you were trying to do all of this yourself?
Each of these systematic reviews were published, and six of the seven areas have been the topic of a symposium. From these symposia, several papers were published, and more are on the way, that can help you move the research on self-care behaviors into your DSME/T clinical practice, ultimately improving outcomes for the patients you work with each day. Read the AADE7 Systematic Reviews here.
There are also other studies that we have access to that support diabetes education by proving that it is cost-effective and beneficial for clinical outcomes (including initial and follow-up interventions). This may be something you want to review for communications with employers and insurance companies.
How might you use this information? My first move was to go to the systematic review for what I consider my main area of practice (physical activity). But, probably more importantly, I then looked to the information on the other topics. And now, when people ask me about the importance and effectiveness of diabetes education and educators, I have some answers!
Did you know that all of these papers were out there? How might you use them in your practice and professional life?