DIAMONDS Randomised Control Trial
Research type
Research Study
Full title
DIAMONDS - Improving diabetes self-management for people with severe mental illness
IRAS ID
316173
Contact name
Najma Siddiqi
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of York
ISRCTN Number
22275538
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 6 months, 1 days
Research summary
People with severe mental illness (SMI), such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, have poorer physical health and a shorter life expectancy by around 20 years compared with the general population. Higher rates and poorer management of physical long-term conditions such as diabetes and heart disease are partly to blame. There may be several reasons for this, including the individual’s mental illness and treatment, challenges to engaging in healthy behaviours (e.g. exercise, healthy eating), and barriers to accessing healthcare and support (e.g. financial, social).
Self-management is an important part of staying well with a long-term condition. There are many self-management programmes in the NHS to help people with long-term conditions look after themselves but they often do not address the challenges of people who also have an SMI.
The DIAMONDS research programme have developed a self-management intervention that can specifically help people with diabetes and an SMI to be healthier. It has been developed in partnership with people with mental illness and diabetes, their family members/friends, and the healthcare staff who support them. The DIAMONDS intervention is a 6-month programme that consists of daily self-management tasks (such as goal setting and action planning) and 1-to-1 meetings with a trained facilitator.
In this study, which is phase 4 of the DIAMONDS programme, we will compare two groups of participants to test whether our intervention works. One group will receive the DIAMONDS intervention, the other will not. It will be decided randomly which participant will be in which group. We will take blood samples at the beginning of the study and after 6 and 12 months to see if the intervention helps people look after their diabetes.REC name
West of Scotland REC 3
REC reference
22/WS/0117
Date of REC Opinion
23 Aug 2022
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion