Effects of nursing interventions based on the self-care deficit nursing theory on the health outcomes in Type-2 diabetic patients

Objectives: The study aims to investigate the effects of interventions based on the self-care deficit nursing theory on the self-care agency, self-care activities, HbA1c levels, lipid levels and waist circumferences in people with type-2 diabetes. Methods: The study is a double-blind, randomized controlled, intervention study. With the block-randomized method, 70 patients were assigned into the intervention group and 69 patients into the control group. After the pre-test was given, the intervention group had diabetes self-management education based on SCDNT in April 2012. Data were collected through the exercise of self-care agency, diabetes self-care activities questionnaire, basic characteristics of ındividuals with diabetes conditional diagnosis form and biological results follow-up form. The analysis of data was conducted using t-test, chi-square, student's t-test for independent samples and dependent samples. The intention-to-treat analysis was performed due to losses to follow-up. Results: After the intervention, there was a significant improvement in the HbA1c levels and the mean self-care agency scores in the intervention group compared to the pre-intervention values (p <0.05), whereas they did not change in the control group (p> 0.05). There was a significant increase in the diet, exercise and foot care self-care behavior scores of the intervention after the post-intervention 6th month compared to the pre-intervention values (p <0.05). There wasn?t a significant change in the lipid levels and waist circumference scores of the intervention and control groups after the post-intervention 6th month compared to the pre-intervention values. Conclusion: After the SCDNT-based self-management education, the self-care agency, self-care behaviors and glycemic control in individuals with diabetes improved. The researchers utilized the SCDNT during the planning phase of the study and the self-management education process. The SCDNT can be used in the self-management education of individuals with diabetes. Keywords: HbA1c, Self-Care Agency, Self-Care Behaviors, Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory, Self-Management education, Type 2 Diabetes.