Barriers to diabetes care include restaurants and high-risk lifestyles, says internatio...( Eating out lack of social support an...),Health

Eating out, lack of social support and high-risk lifestyles are just some of the barriers that stop patients with type 2 diabetes from controlling their condition, according to a research review that covered 8,900 patients and 4,550 healthcare providers from 28 countries.

The study, published in the March issue of the Journal of Nursing and Healthcare of Chronic Illness, shows that psychosocial, socioeconomic, physical, environmental and cultural factors can provide major barriers to effective care.

Researchers from Hong Kong and Northern Ireland studied research carried out between 1986 and 2007 to try and identify how treatment regimes could be improved. Their findings have enabled them to come up with a three-point plan for nurses involved in diabetes care.

"Diabetes is a chronic condition and patients need to modify their lifestyle on a long-term basis to cope with it" says Sandra Pun from the School of Nursing at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

"According to the World Health Organization, up to 380 million people worldwide will suffer from diabetes by 2025 so it is important to identify and tackle any barriers that prevent people from making those changes."

Major barriers identified by the review included:

• Financial. Even if healthcare was free or funded by insurance, patients still had to spend more money on healthy food, home glucose monitoring kits and transport to and from healthcare appointments.

• Social support. Patients who received support from family, friends and diabetes clinics appeared to handle self-care better than those who did not

• Patient provider gaps. Care was more effective when patients and healthcare providers worked together to devise treatment plans that patients could stick to.

• Meals out. Eating out in restaurants was a frequently mentioned problem and being offered inappropriate food when visiting others was also an
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