GLASGOW, SCOTLAND — Vulnerable individuals need personalized help and information presented in appropriate formats to enable them to manage their own diabetes, Madeline Turton said at the Diabetes U.K. Annual Professional Conference.
Ms. Turton, a diabetes patient and chair of Diabetes U.K.'s West Dorset Group, Weymouth (England), presented the results of a qualitative investigation into the attitudes of vulnerable groups to information about their diabetes. She defined vulnerable adults as any person older than 18 who may be in need of community care services and unable to take care of themselves or protect themselves against harm or exploitation.
Included in the survey were people from nomadic communities who are transient and hard to reach; people with learning difficulties for whom accessing appropriate information is a problem; and prisoners, of whom a disproportionate number come from ethic groups that have a high prevalence of diabetes. The exact number of patients surveyed was not available.
Through a series of interviews, Ms. Turton sought to ascertain how health professionals could most productively help support these groups. Several points were repeatedly cited by interviewees as potential areas for improvement.
First was the need to meet health professionals in an environment in which they felt comfortable and empowered, usually in the patients' own community. Health clinics frequently do not meet these criteria, said Ms. Turton.
She said the most common request from vulnerable individuals was that health professionals should “use language and resources with which I am familiar and will facilitate my understanding.” In addition, the survey highlighted that vulnerable people want messages repeated in “a supportive and nonjudgmental way.”
An issue that particularly affects disabled people and those with learning disabilities was the need to maintain their independence, according to Ms. Turton. “Vulnerable people with diabetes need help to gain the support of family and friends without them taking over,” she said. “People with learning disabilities were worried about parents taking them back home, and elderly people were scared of children putting them in homes or taking them in.”
Vulnerability can be affected by various factors, including level of understanding and state of health (either physical or psychological), Ms. Turton said. But for all groups, communication is vitally important to helping them manage their diabetes.
“Generalization is not helpful, and it is important to realize that people may belong to one or several vulnerable groups,” she said.
Ms. Turton said the message to diabetes professionals was that they cannot improve compliance among their vulnerable patients—but they can help their patients to manage themselves. “You can get people into a place where they can better manage their own diabetes and promote personal empowerment through appropriate formatting of information,” she concluded.