A Multiple Behavior Self-Monitoring Intervention for African- American Veterans with Type 2 Diabetes: A Feasibility Implementation Study.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the feasibility of implementing a multiple-behavior self-monitoring intervention within a diabetes education program. This study was a 3-month pre- post-design, conducted with African-Americans (N = 20), who attended diabetes education classes at a large Veteran's Affairs (VA) hospital in Southwest Texas. Participants selfmonitored their blood glucose, diet, exercise, and weight on either a smart phone application or paper diaries. Paired t tests showed strong evidence that patient self-monitoring of healthy lifestyle behaviors improved blood glucose (t = -3.858, p = .001) and HbAlc (t = -4.428, p <.001), respectively. Moreover Spearman's correlation coefficient showed significant correlations between blood glucose and exercise (rs = -.68, p = .008) and HbAlc and exercise (rs = -.56, p = .036). This feasibility study showed that multiple-behavior self-monitoring was effective in lowering blood glucose and HbA1c levels among African-American Veterans; however, a randomized controlled trial with a larger sample is needed to validate these preliminary findings.