Development and Effectiveness of Dietary Self-care Promotion Program Using Online Community for Hemodialysis...

This study aimed to develop and evaluate a dietary self-care promotion program for hemodialysis patients based on Hurley's self-efficacy model, utilizing an online community to enhance the dietary self-care behavior of patients undergoing hemodialysis.

The needs of hemodialysis patients were identified, and an online community-based dietary self-care promotion program was developed with expert evaluations. Forty-four hemodialysis patients were randomly assigned to an experimental group (n = 22) and a control group (n = 22). The program was applied to the experimental group for four weeks. Before and after the intervention, as well as four weeks after the intervention, dietary self-efficacy, dietary self-care behavior, interdialytic weight gain, serum phosphorus, and serum potassium were assessed in both groups.

Significant differences over time and between groups were observed in dietary self-efficacy, interdialytic weight gain, serum phosphorus, and serum potassium. The interaction between time and group was also significant. While no significant differences were found over time in dietary self-care behavior, significant group differences, and interaction effects between time and group were identified.

The results indicate that the dietary self-care promotion program using an online community for hemodialysis patients is more effective in enhancing dietary self-efficacy and dietary self-care behavior compared to conventional treatment. This suggests the clinical applicability of the proposed dietary self-care promotion program.

This study was registered in the Clinical Research Information Service system (No: KCT0007920).