Health education and communication needs among primary care patients with prediabetes in Singapore: A mixed methods...

To assess factors associated with ever receiving prediabetes education, and to explore the health education and communication needs among primary care patients with prediabetes in Singapore.

A mixed methods study, consisting of a cross-sectional survey involving 433 patients with prediabetes aged 21-79, and in-depth interviews (IDIs) with 48. Multivariable regression was used to analyse the survey results, while thematic analysis was used to analyse the IDIs.

The prevalence of ever receiving prediabetes education was 26.6%. This was positively associated with school education, impaired glucose tolerance, number of co-morbidities, having family or peer with diabetes, having support to reduce diabetes risk, confidence to self-manage prediabetes, and negatively associated with age. A common reason among those not receiving such education was not being referred by doctors. The preferred content of health communication messages were to focus on risk and prevention of diabetes, health and family, and to avoid the term 'prediabetes' in messages. The top 2 preferred education components were healthy eating and physical activity, and the most desired setting was the community centre.

More efforts are needed to increase the take-up rate of prediabetes education. Polyclinic healthcare professionals could provide preliminary advice, and subsequently refer patients to community-based programmes or resources.