Diabetes represents one of most serious public health disease. The aim of the Metabolink project was to develop a smart solution for elderly people with diabetes and obesity, in order to promote a healthier style of life, improve diabetic control trying to reduce overall cost for the community.It consists of an app for Smartphone linked to a system and a process of data collection based on bi dimensional barcode (qr code) and NFC-tag technologies.
The system was accepted by all the patients and they learned efficaciously in a few hours to use it. Unfortunately we observed a drop-out of about 50% in the first month. Patients remaining in the study refer a slight improvement in the Quality of Life Enjoyment and Satisfaction Questionnaire (Q-LES-Q) and General Satisfaction Questionnaire (GSQ) and they decided to continue to use it after the end of the follow-up.
The diabetes represents one of most serious public health disease for the planet. The WHO estimated about 60 million of subjects are affected in Europe. In Italy the rough prevalence is 5.8%. The prevalence of disease in the next years will grow both as a result of the aging of the population and to the increase of the risk factors such as overweight and obesity, sedentary lifestyle and lack of proper nutrition education. Milestone studies have shown that an intensive glycemic treatment significantly reduces microvascular complications with a moderate positive long-term effect on macrovascular complications. The health care systems are called to face this disease that it has not only direct cost linked to pharmacological and complications treatment but also an indirect significant social cost. It is therefore essential for the diabetic patient to carry out a continuous and accurate monitoring of clinically relevant parameters (as blood glucose, blood pressure) and to follow a health life style in order to reduce disease complications permitting to live better maintaining independence for much more longer time. Moreover the majority of patients with diabetes is older and frequently present significant comorbidity making the integrated management of the disease more complex. The aim of the Metabolink project was to develop a smart solution for elderly people with diabetes and obesity, in order to promote a healthier style of life, improve diabetic control (glcaemic control, blood pressure, adherence to a specific diet and treatment) trying to reduce overall cost for the community. The approval of the study for experiments using human subjects was obtained from the local Ethics Committees on human experimentation. Written informed consent for research was obtained from each patient or from relatives/legal guardian in the case of critically disabled demented patients prior to participation in the study.
No comments:
Post a Comment