Quality of Life and Technology: Impact on Children and Families With Diabetes

Abstract

Ensuring quality of life (QOL) while maintaining glycemic control within targets is an important challenge in type 1 and type 2 diabetes treatment. For children with diabetes, QOL includes enjoying meals, feeling safe in school, and perceiving positive, supportive relationships with parents, siblings, and friends. Yet many treatment-related and psychosocial barriers can interfere with a child’s QOL and their ability to manage diabetes effectively. Diabetes management also imposes considerable lifestyle demands that are difficult and often frustrating for children to negotiate at a young age. Recent advances in diabetes medications and technologies have improved glycemic control in children with diabetes. Two widely used technologies are the insulin pump and continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) system. These technologies provide patients with more flexibility in their daily life and information about glucose fluctuations. Several studies report improvements in glycemic control in children with type 1 diabetes using the insulin pump or sensor-augmented pump therapy. Importantly, these technologies may impact QOL for children and families with diabetes, although they are rarely used or studied in the treatment of children with type 2 diabetes. Further, emerging closed loop and web- and phone-based technologies have great potential for supporting diabetes self-management and perhaps QOL. A deeper understanding and appreciation of the impact of diabetes technology on children’s and parents’ QOL is critical for both the medical and psychological care of diabetes. Thus, the purpose of this review is to discuss the impact of new diabetes technologies on QOL in children, adolescents and families with type 1 diabetes.

Continuous monitoring of blood glucose in the practice of endocrinologist

“…Обучение -одно из показа-ний к непродолжительному использованию CGM-RT, когда целью данного способа самоконтроля становится не сиюминутное улучшение показателей гликемии, а создание у пациента правдоподобного представле-ния об истинных изменениях концентрации глюкозы в крови под влиянием различных факторов [20]. Это от-носится как ко взрослым пациентам, так и к детям, когда основная задача состоит в обучение семьи [32].…”

Design Experiments. Identifying areas for intervention and designing medical technology for adolescents and young adults with type 1 diabetes

“…Research has indicated a variety of psychosocial benefits and barriers to the use of these medical devices (Alsaleh, Smith, & Taylor, 2012;Hirose, Beverly, & Weinger, 2012;McCarthy, Rodríguez Ramírez, & Robinson, 2016;Ritholz et al, 2007). In one study, blood glucose testing was a source of social discomfort, with adolescents' self-management being influenced by observers, different contexts, and anticipated negative reactions to high or low blood glucose levels.…”

A co-regulatory approach to stay safe online: reporting inappropriate content with the MediaKids mobile app

“…Kasesniemi, 2003;Oksman and Rautiainen, 2003;Ito, 2005;Chen and Katz, 2009;Kaare et al, 2007;Plowman et al, 2010;Green et al, 2011Green et al, , 2012Green et al, , 2013Hertlein, 2012;Jackson et al, 2012;Palmer et al, 2012;Plowman and McPake, 2013;McPake et al, 2013;Livingstone et al, 2014b;Livingstone et al, 2015). Other studies address specific groups within these ages, such as children with diabetes (Hirose et al, 2012;Toscos et al, 2012), asthma (Mosnaim et al, 2012) intellectual and developmental disabilities (Palmer et al, 2012;Hwang et al 2014), complex communication needs (Light and McNaughton, 2012) and obesity (Woolford et al, 2012;Sharifi et al, 2013). In Europe, the most comprehensive studies have been produced by the EU projects, "EU Kids Online" 2 and "Net Children Go Mobile", 3 which conducted a panEuropean survey of interviews over 33,000 children (as well as some of their parents and teachers) between 2010-2014.…”