Exploring educational needs and design aspects of internet-enabled patient education for persons with diabetes: a qualitative interview study

Abstract

ObjectiveThe objective of this article is to explore the educational needs and design aspects of personalised internet-enabled education for patients with diabetes in Iran.DesignData were collected using semistructured interviews and then qualitatively analysed using inductive content analysis.Participants9 patients with type 2 diabetes were included. Inclusion criteria were access to and knowledge on how to use the internet. The selection ensured representation based on gender, age, occupation and educational background.SettingThe sample population was patients with diabetes who were admitted to an outpatient diabetes clinic in Mashhad, a large city of Iran with about 3 million inhabitants.Results4 core categories emerged from the data: (1) seeking knowledge about diabetes, including specific knowledge acquisition, patient's interactions and learning requirements; (2) teaching and learning, including using different teaching methods and different ways to learn about the disease; (3) facilitators, including internet and mobile phone use to learn about the disease; and (4) barriers, including lack of internet access, uncertainty of access to the internet and lack of website in the local language and also perceived cultural barriers, such as patients' fears of the internet, lack of time and awareness.ConclusionsThis study provides a better understanding of the patient's educational expectations and technical needs in relation to internet-enabled education. This knowledge will inform the development of functional mock-ups in the next research phase using a design-based research approach in order to design internet-enabled patient education for self-management of diabetes.

Patients’ and healthcare professionals’ perspectives towards technology-assisted diabetes self-management education. A qualitative systematic review

“…The electronic search results identified a total of 4,233 abstracts and 259 articles were subjected to a full text review, of which 15 papers met the inclusion criteria [31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43]. Cumulatively, the articles included a total of 270 adult patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus and HCPs, with five studies originating from the United States, five from the United Kingdom, three from Canada and one from Iran and Belgium respectively.…”

“…There were five types of interventions used in the papers. Nine papers used a web-based interventions [32,33,35,36,[39][40][41][42][43][44], while the others used either a mobile phone applications (apps) [38,45], a digital versatile disc (DVD) [34], virtual reality [31], or telehealth [37]. Three studies also explored the HCPs' views on this subject [34,37,41].…”

“…Patients with limited web access due to poor infrastructure or due to personal reasons were unable to access the interventions [33,36,37]. Some had issues with the cost of the interventions, believing that these should be free of charge [42].…”

Educational needs in patients with spondyloarthritis in Sweden – a mixed-methods study

“…Patient education is an important and recommended non-pharmacological treatment for patients with different chronic diseases, including SpA [ 22 , 23 ]. Earlier studies in the field have concentrated on patients with rheumatoid arthritis, and not much research has been done in patients with SpA [ 11 , 31 ]. The results from the present study showed that almost half of the patients with SpA considered that they had a need for education, and the areas concerning self-help, feelings, and the disease process were those that were most requested.…”

“…Individually tailored education have been requested [ 7 ] but often the prioritisation of topics to be discussed still differs between patients and health professionals [ 5 ]. Patient education has spread more widely than within healthcare itself, with e-health and web-based health resources such as telehealth platforms, online communication services, and smartphones emerging as new methods of communication and education [ 3 , 9 – 11 ].…”