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Adolescent diabetes management and mismanagement
J Weissberg-Benchell1, A M Glasgow, W D Tynan
1Children's National Medical Center, Department of Endocrinology, Washington, DC 20010.
Objective:
To document the existence and prevalence of adolescent-generated diabetes management techniques.
Research Design And Methods:
One hundred forty-four adolescents completed the confidential questionnaire developed for this study. Glycohemoglobin was also obtained for each individual.
Results:
Within the 10 days before their clinic visit, many adolescents admitted to engaging in various mismanagement behaviors, with 25% admitting to missing shots. Parents tend to underestimate adolescent mismanagement. Missing shots was significantly related to poor control (P < 0.01). Older adolescents engaged in more mismanagement than their younger cohorts (P < 0.001). The questionnaire factored into two subscales: blatant mismanagement and faking.
Conclusions:
This study shows the importance of recognizing the prevalence of mismanagement among adolescents.